We Want To Live Like Trees
by recycled-stars
Summary: AU. Post Knockout, Castle and Beckett stumble towards something new, but as the conspiracy begins to unravel around them, Beckett realizes there are some stands we make alone.
1. Prologue

Author's Notes: The first part of a rather lengthy post-finale story I started (and did not finish, oops) writing for het_bigbang at Livejournal. After the prologue, it picks up during _Knockout_. A little bit darker than the usual post-finale fare. And 90% of it was done before _Rise_ aired, so consider it AU.

Fair warning, this essentially started as a sex scene against a wall and the thought "how can I invent a way for Beckett to bad ass her way about Manhattan stealing cars?" i.e. 'Kate Beckett: Action Movie Hero'. When I started, I wanted to have her walk away from an explosion without looking back, but sadly, that wasn't feasible... there was a more serious summary I wrote somewhere, ah, here it is:

_After the events of the season finale, Castle and Beckett stumble towards something new, but the weight of the past threatens not only their newfound understanding, but also their lives. As the conspiracy begins to unravel around them, Beckett realises there are some stands we have to make alone._

Well, that was super dramatic. I think I like my silly one better. Anyway, the title and chapter titles are nabbed from Twenty One Love Poems by Adrienne Rich. And this was edited by **lady_of_scarlet** and **oroburos69** at LJ, who did an amazingly quick turnaround on the first half. A hundred thank yous. (Aaaand all remaining mistakes, definitely my own.)

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><p><strong>Prologue: Whatever happens with us, your body will haunt mine.<strong>

It was raining. Gushing water sped through the city's gutters, and the soft trickle down drainpipes was audible in the bones of the building behind her. She tucked her hands further into the worn sweatshirt and stepped backwards, pressing against the bricks in an attempt to find shelter. It was a futile attempt and she was already soaking besides. Beads of water were collecting at the tip of nose and sinking into her hair. She stared down at her feet.

The meeting had gone well, objectively speaking. Her pockets were now free of the weight of the considerable amount of cash required to purchase the information she required. She bit her lip. She was waiting for the contact to leave the diner. If he'd been sent to double-cross her, now would be the time to follow her. Her hands checked that the solid weight of her weapon was still firmly in place. Comforted, she stole a glance up and down the street. There, in front of the diner, a small, balding man in a suit opened a colourful umbrella and stepped out into the downpour. He walked n the opposite direction to where she stood. Sighing out, she turned and followed him a ways, until she was satisfied he was simply going back to his office job.

She took the long way back to her apartment, walking several blocks behind the row of housing, through an alley. When she sure she wasn't being followed, she turned and doubled back the way she came, finding the red brick building and fumbling for her key to the glass door.

It caught her reflection, but she almost didn't recognise it. The unnaturally fair-haired woman in the glass had an empty, vacant stare. She had been dimly aware of a dull ache in her chest all day, the flesh remembering the trauma it had endured and calling her attention to it in the cold air, but it stung more sharply now. She was momentarily paralysed by the pain. It was largely psychosomatic, she knew.

Taking a few deep breaths to quiet her heart, she pushed through the entrance and began the long climb. It was barely mid-afternoon but the stairway was dark. Six flights later, she paused again, forehead resting against a worn wooden door with only one number still left emblazoned on its face. The other had fallen into the corner of the frame and sometimes got jammed beneath the wood. She'd left it where it landed.

Another key fell into another lock; this one was more particular. She jimmied it up and down and used her knee to brace the door, pushing inward until it gave way with a loud creak. The hallway was wide and empty behind her.

A cockroach scuttled across the stained rug that graced the doorway. She brought her foot down on it, heel squeezing its guts against the carpet. There wasn't much point in it, there were always more where one came from, but she felt a small stab of satisfaction through the haze clouding her mind. She kicked the carcass into the hall and closed the door, locking and dead-bolting it behind her.

The next steps were a ritual dance. She reached into the waistband of her jeans and removed the unlicensed Glock 19. (It was probably stupid, she knew, to buy a weapon she'd always favoured, but hell, something had to feel familiar in these strange days, even if it was just the gun in her hand). It went in the top drawer of the dresser beside the door. Then, she steadied her foot on the desk, pulled up her jeans and unstrapped its smaller cousin. The weapon remained on the table top but she pulled off the holster, rubbing her skin to soothe the marks it left on her calf. Next was the knife, slipped into the front pocket of her jeans. That went in the top drawer of the desk, beneath a collection of personal items. Finally, she pulled her prize from her pocket, a water-stained diner napkin with an address on it and pinned it to the wall above the desk, applying concentrated pressure to a thumb tack. It sank into the cheap plaster wall that divided the space into rooms. This latest puzzle piece hung beside a series of notecards and post-its, what she had managed to salvage of the murder board from her apartment. She ran her fingers along her long-ago memorised efforts absently.

The death rattles of the gas heater on the opposite wall blew a lukewarm gust of air across her wet torso and she shivered. Remembering herself, she stripped off the hoodie and her jeans, lobbing them across the room into the pile accumulating next to the full laundry basket. She had been putting off a trip to the laundromat for nearly a week. She didn't like unnecessarily exposing herself to the risks of the outside world. Inside the grimy studio, she at least felt some modicum of security. Outside the building though, walking the fine line between caution and paranoia grew exhausting.

She didn't bother with a shower. The pipes were unreliable in bad weather.

Instead, she grabbed the weapon and doubled back to the door to re-check the locks. Satisfied, she let the light switch snap off and, by the light of the streetlamp that flickered outside her window, navigated to the bed.

The linen was one of few indulgences she'd allowed herself, and the sheets, while in need of laundering, were still soft and comforting. He'd had similar sheets, she remembered, running her hand over them, lost in thought. His had smelled of the intermingling scents of their shampoos, cherries and something she could never quite place, fresh but simultaneously earthy.

She crawled beneath the sheets and let her nose sink into the pillow. She could almost imagine it; almost pretend it was one of the nights just after she had been released from the hospital when she would wake to find him gone. She knew where she would find him, in his study in the dark, tapping away at the keyboard or staring at the screensaver urging him on. Getting him back to bed had never been difficult.

Her fingers curled against the sheets, still fisted around the gun and she was pulled from the memory by the feel of it. Twisting, she set it on the nightstand and curled at the waist to pull the covers up to her chin. Reaching backward, she unclasped her bra and manoeuvred it out from between the layers of clothing. She tossed it across the room blindly. Still sitting, she let her head rest against her knees, hugging them to her chest, letting her lips press against her skin. She had gotten used to comforting herself in such ways, accustomed to and even bored of her own company.

It had only been weeks, but already she could barely remember a time before her solitary existence. Her days were lonely, but most of the time she didn't notice. There were other things to occupy her mind, men who sent assassins to clean up their messes and a cover-up of a seemingly unimportant crime with a growing death toll. Still, on the nights she didn't fall onto the mattress in the grey light of dawn and sleep immediately, she missed her makeshift family, missed Ryan and Esposito goading each other over paperwork, missed Lanie's sense of humour at a crime scene, and missed Castle.

She liked to tell herself she didn't think of him often, that she was slowly forgetting, that the absence of his weight at her shoulder as she ran her investigation was becoming familiar, that she didn't ache to hear him spin an outlandish theory or huff an innuendo in her ear. But part of her was always aware. It was a quiet part, that rarely made itself heard except on nights like this one, when the soft patter of rain on the ceiling lulled her mind, and the chill in the air reminded her of the last time she had felt truly warm, his naked body curled at her back, his breath tickling gently against the curve of her neck, their hands entwined against the pillow.

He had been tonguing the curve of her shoulder, then, lower, across the protrusion of her scapulae, down the curve of her spine, and his hand had pulled from hers to finger her chest, sliding across the thoracotomy scar between her breasts, along her true ribs, glancing the smaller scars, like overgrown pockmarks, from the chest tubes that had drained her pericardium and pleural space after surgery. Her heart, still valiantly beating in spite of its injuries, had hastened its pace. _You're alive_, it hammered in her ears, _a-live_, _a-live_, _a-live_. Her lungs were in on it too, this living business, and she cried out when his wandering hands found purchase, his mouth rounding the crest of her hip, his fingers tugging insistently at her nipple.

The thought of it was enough to conjure a ghost of that heat between her legs, the memory of her skin burning and his fingers curling inside her, his mouth at her hip, teeth nipping, pulling sounds from her chest that still ached, whispered encouragement and animal need and his thumb, lazily slipping against her clit with measured clumsiness. She had been scorching then, frenzied in her need, face pressed into the pillow, fingernails scratching at the sheets, her hair a mess, spilling over her shoulders and slipping into her mouth as she gasped, her lungs inflating and deflating as though they'd never forgotten how.

She had clawed her way onto her stomach and pressed her hips against his fingers, her whole body tensing around his hand. He didn't let up, didn't give her trembling muscles time to still or her mind time to recover itself. Instead, before she had known what was happening she was blinking up at him, legs folded around his middle, their foreheads pressed together. His hands were wet with her and he shifted, bringing one up to tangle in her hair. She was shuddering beneath him before he even moved, gasping up, trying to find his mouth with hers. She mewled when his hips pressed into hers, the sound muted against his tongue and he tugged at her hair, her heels pressing into his back.

She faded; her mind unaware of anything outside of their bodies, outside of his hand trapped between them, her racing pulse and his ragged breathing. He was calling her name, saying he loved her, a mirror of his words on the grass at the cemetery, his hands pressing into her body for different reasons, eliciting different responses. She tried to speak, tried to tell him she felt the same way, but he was kissing her again and she couldn't form the words. All the tension in her released at once, her teeth sank into his lip as it shattered through her, her entire body burning.

He swore in her ear, _fuck Kate_, _you're so amazing _and sex-hazed and humming from the pleasure of it, she laughed, her hands mapping his face as he pressed it into her shoulder, slumping against her, hairline dewy with sweat.

Her hands were freezing between her thighs. It wasn't the same without him. Then again, very little was.


	2. Chapter One

Author's Notes: This story is 95% finished, so I'll be posting it fairly quickly to get it out of the way now that the new season has premiered. (Because I would much rather be writing a series of short post-eps where Beckett dishes with the shrink. Or you know, pretty much _anything _else. This has been about three months of work the muses are weary.) This chapter is alternatively titled "the one in which there is making out and one kind of naughty word". Cover the appropriate eyes now. When you get to the bottom, feel free to drop any and all thoughts into a review. I do love to hear what people think!**  
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><p><strong>Chapter One: That conversation we were always on the edge of having runs on in my head.<strong>

Montgomery died on a Monday night just before it became Tuesday morning. Ryan and Esposito had been first on the scene, and they'd brought back-up. When it became apparent that the reinforcements and paramedics weren't necessary, they had somehow managed to prevent the crime scene techs swarming into the warehouse until Beckett had been pulled upright. She shook off Castle's hand and glared, until he held up his hands in surrender and lurked a foot further from her shoulder than usual. She tossed her hair, wiped her hands on her slacks, not caring about the blood, and reached into her pocket for her keys. "You coming?" she asked him, trying not to snap. Her voice was thin, full of tension, as though she was a second away from cracking into pieces.

He nodded once. "But… shouldn't we stay? They'll want to ask questions."

She cursed, softly. "Tomorrow. I can't do it now."

He shrugged his acquiescence.

Ryan and Esposito met them in the quiet corner of the warehouse, near the back door that led to her car.

"Beckett," Esposito began, helplessly. Her gaze tore into him but it wasn't angry, just full of everything he felt himself. No one's eyes were really dry.

Her teeth sunk into her lip and she sucked in a breath then reached out and squeezed his arm. "I know."

"They're going to want a statement." Ryan's hands were in his pockets. He shifted his weight, nervously, as though he knew that she wouldn't like what he was saying. "From you, and from Castle."

"We need to talk first." She glanced at the three men in front of her - the three most important men in her life apart from the one lying dead behind her - and frowned. "But not here."

"You want to get our story straight," Ryan accused.

"He ... a lot happened here tonight," she said slowly, "He was our captain." She was addressing the words to Ryan, and she turned her scrutiny to his eye. "What happened to you?"

Esposito shifted uncomfortably.

"You're not the only one who had a hard time believing it was Montgomery," Ryan told her, cryptically. "Ok, fine. We'll say we don't know anything, and that you want to wait until the morning to give a statement."

"Don't send unies to tell Evelyn," she heard herself say it, and the words lurched from somewhere in her stomach. She felt them settle, the weight of it almost too much to bear. She needed to get out of there.

Her hands fisted around her car keys. She was too close to losing it, and she could handle breaking in front of Castle, she knew it didn't change her in his esteem, but in front of the rest of the team, after she'd spent so long building a reputation independent of her gender? That she couldn't do as readily.

Esposito nodded. "We'll do it Beckett."

She swallowed and looked down for a moment. "Thanks. But I should be there too. Give me a few hours."

"Sure."

She left them to supervise the crime scene and unlocked the car from a distance. For once, Castle was quiet. She slumped into the driver's seat and leaned her head back against the headrest, closing her eyes for a brief moment.

She held out a hand in his direction when she heard him inhale, about to start a sentence. "I'm fine," she preempted him, twisting the keys in the ignition and feeling the rumble of the engine stirring to life. It was the only sound; the drive back to the city stretched out before them in heavy silence.

She nearly made it to the merge onto the I-80-E before the tears came. After many years of grief, Kate Beckett had learned to cry almost silently and with as much as grace as it was possible to cry. Her mascara was waterproof, but there was nothing for the eyeliner that smudged down her cheeks in dark trails. Her vision was blurred with tears, though she tried to blink them away.

Castle let his hand rest against hers on the gearstick. "Beckett," he said, but she angled her face away from him, pulling her hand from beneath his to wipe her cheek. "Pull over," he continued, and it was gentle, but still obviously a command.

She was too tired to fight him when she knew he was right, apparently a recurring theme. She pushed her blinker on and came to a crawl on the gravel at the shoulder. It was late enough that the traffic was almost sparse, for the city. She put her hazard lights on anyway and felt at her hip for her badge in case anyone gave them trouble.

She swallowed, wiped her cheeks again and threw the car into park. Then, she drew her knees to her chest and leaned her face against the window. Above them, the streetlights that lit the highway cast them in orange light. She watched her reflection in the window. She felt so much simmering beneath the surface; the unanswered questions, the climbing death toll, the betrayals on all sides, were, in that moment, too much.

Castle let her have her moment, a full minute of silence, before her silent crying became more audible, and he unfolded her arms and tugged at her body until she fell into his side, the handbrake digging into her hip. She didn't care. He shifted to hold her, awkwardly, across the console and she felt her tears slip into his shirt until it was wet beneath her forehead. Still, the silence between them persisted. She took a few shaky breaths then pulled back, her hand still fisted in his shirt and looked at him. "You knew," she murmured, but it wasn't really an accusation. Some things, she knew, went without blame.

"He called me." He looked pained by it. "And... I tried to call you, but you weren't answering."

That was true. The number of missed calls had approached three digits by the end of their day apart. She shrugged, apologetically, and blinked back yet more tears. She didn't know where they were coming from. She rarely cried. Perhaps it was the shock. Perhaps it was just that it was either that or scream.

"I wasn't ready to talk to you. I... didn't want to have to apologise," she admitted, hinting at sheepish, which was more concession that he'd ever expected. "Or deal with it," she sighed out, and twisted away from him, drumming her fingers against the steering wheel. "Which I suppose we have to."

"Not now." He reached over and curled his fingers through hers, squeezing reassuringly. "There are more important things."

She nodded her agreement, unspeakably grateful for the chance to table that conversation. "Just, I am sorry Castle. I know… " She licked her lips and turned back to him but left the sentence unfinished. "You were you, I was me... and sometimes that doesn't work out so well for us."

"It could," he said, almost too quietly to be heard.

She gave him one of her saddest looks and he wanted to smooth the lines from her face with his thumbs, to kiss her, almost more than ever before. It burned through him suddenly and he moved to touch her cheek but her hands caught his wrist and stilled it. The grip of her fingers tightened and she inhaled sharply.

Somehow, this was where they found themselves, a deserted highway in Jersey on the wrong side of midnight. She had imagined this conversation going differently; him at the door of her apartment when he got sick of her ignoring his calls and her unwilling to budge. Instead, she felt her walls crumble a little further. She felt trapped in the rubble, and she fought two instincts, to give up the fight entirely, to lay it all out and see where the pieces fell and to run, like she usually did. She did neither.

She didn't answer him, except to reach out and press her palm to his face. He met her eyes when she turned his head, and reached up to encircle her wrist with his hand, his thumb sliding along her wrist. She smiled, sadly. "I don't know what to tell you," she said.

"Beckett," he almost pleaded. "Don't. Not now. Please. I can't hear it now."

"Why are you so sure you know what I'm going to say?" she whispered, leaning closer until it fell across his lips.

"I'm not," he realised, letting his hand slip along her arm, inch by inch. She didn't move, didn't push him away. He paused at her elbow and let his fingers slip to her waist. And then he waited, for her to pull away, for him to tell her to stop, for either of them to move, but the pause lingered. His chest tightened under her unwavering gaze.

She was searching for something, but even she didn't know what, something to make sense of all that happened, of the chaos that had overtaken them in the past 24 hours. And then she kissed him, for all the things neither of them could say.

It was soft at first, but his breath hissed into it and she let her weight fall against him, her tongue sliding insistently against his. He braced her waist with splayed fingers, her shirt bunching beneath them to reveal the skin of her stomach. She closed her eyes when his thumb traced over it lazily and then she was aching for that contact elsewhere. She caught his lip with her teeth to silence a moan and he opened his eyes to stare at her.

"God, Beckett." He leaned forward and buried his nose in her neck, kissing her jaw where it met her body.

"Don't ask me." She turned her head away from him to give him better access and he reached out and twisted his fingers through the ends of her hair, tugging just enough that it didn't really hurt, so much as make her breath catch. His teeth grazed at her neck through the turtleneck. God, why were they so good at this? She curled her toes and kicked off her shoes, nerves flooding with calcium and sending shivers running through her.

"What?" he mumbled into her neck, the fingers under her shirt tightening around her torso.

"Don't ask me what we're doing," she warned, breathing heavily. She brought one hand up around his neck, pushing her fingers through his hair.

"You don't have to explain it to me," he managed to quip before she kissed him again, fiercely, with all the grief and frustration she had left and a few years of constrained desires fighting free.

This, this was why she never let them do this. It suddenly wasn't enough, never could be, and now she was a convinced it was a dangerous need that would consume them both. Her toes curled, free of her shoes and she scrambled to her knees, pushing him backwards with one hand and bracing herself on the handbrake with the other.

"What are you doing?" He pulled his mouth from hers barely long enough to ask the question. She held the handbrake in position and slid across into his lap with a kind of grace that made the move looked practiced.

"Safety," she began, still concentrating on moving her limbs, "First."

He was torn between asking her how she'd learned to do it and cataloguing every detail for later use in _Heat Rises_. And then she was straddling him and her body was pressed into his and she was still kissing him, somehow, and he wasn't thinking at all. There was some small part of his brain that screamed louder than the rest though, and it was saying _stop_, _stop_, _stop_in time with the rocking motion of her hips. He reached out and curled his thumbs through the belt loops of her pants, stilling her body with his hands.

She settled against them and slid her nose along his in retreat, one eyebrow raised. "Really?" She read his protest on his face.

"You know it's for all the wrong reasons," he accused her.

But he found his hands wandering beneath the hem of her shirt, fingers dancing along her stomach and upwards, upwards. He wasn't that brave though. And he also wasn't doing anything to help his case. Her teeth sank into her lip and she looked away. "I hate it that you're right."

He pulled her forward until she was pressed into his chest, though she continued to stare out the window out at the deserted freeway.

"It's not that I don't want to," he told her.

She smiled, but humourlessly. "Oh, I _know_you want to."

She leaned forward to whisper it in his ear, drawing out each word. "I can feel how much you do."

It clenched through him, her tone and her teeth closing around his earlobe and tugging. He let his fingernails dig into her back and was overcome with remorse for ever deigning to open his mouth. Who cared about the reasons? The right ones were always buried somewhere in the mess of the after, especially with the two of them.

But with Kate Beckett there were no second chances, and her attention had been drawn to the fact that it was a temporary insanity she shouldn't have indulged. She hid her face in his shoulder and let a few extra tears fall, grief for them solely this time and not for Roy Montgomery. He reached out and let his palm smooth her hair. "Beckett." He let his lips move against her temple in a kind of wordy kiss.

She shook her head and sucked in a breath, hating how unsteady it sounded. When she spoke though, it was without wavering, as always. "I didn't want to ruin us Castle._Fuck_. I'm sorry."

"You didn't ruin anything," he tried to reassure her, "Except some crudely inaccurate fantasies. And I suppose you didn't ruin those so much as colour them with realism."

She snorted, once, with amusement. He'd take what he could get.

He hugged her, hands on the outside of her clothes now, sensing that the moment had well and truly passed. "I'm sorry," he whispered.

She pulled back and let her finger trace over the outline of his lips. "What for?"

"Montgomery, not getting through to you when I called, carrying you out of that warehouse."

It was tenderer than it had a right to be. Not for the first time, he wondered how two people could be so firmly committed to denial. He didn't understand her. She was more than happy to talk with him like a lover, to kiss him near senseless; they'd had so many moments, and he was sure she was just as in them as he was. But the next day, she'd be just as happy to pretend things were as they always had been.

Or maybe she just conceded change more subtlely. Like so many things about her, it drove him mad. He reached out and tucked her hair behind her ear, staring at her in the dim light. This, maybe, they couldn't run from.

He continued, still playing with the ends of her hair. "Kissing you, not kissing you, I don't know, your mother, everything bad that has ever happened to you. You don't deserve any of it."

"The world breaks everyone just the same Castle." She smiled, weakly.

"Hemmingway." He smiled back, in appreciation. "Paraphrased."

"It seemed appropriate."

"I love it that you read," he told her, but the words spun and twisted between her ears in her head until she understood their full meaning.

A moment that should have seemed out of place felt far too familiar. She swallowed back all her reservations and insecurities, which could wait for another time, and reached out to clasp his hand, stilling it against her cheek. "Thank you," she whispered. "For being there, even when I told you not to be."

"I like to think it's written in the stars that you'll always forgive me eventually," he teased her lightly.

Beckett raised an eyebrow, characteristically, but her face fell almost as soon. "We should get back to the city. Ryan and Esposito might beat us otherwise. And I should... Evelyn doesn't deserve to be kept waiting."

He nodded, but felt her reluctance when she didn't move. He was happy to avoid shattering whatever disturbance in the space-time continuum allowed her to be so close and so amenable to touching. At length, she twisted away from him. He reached up and caught her chin between his thumb and forefinger. She blinked, questioning.

"We could be whatever you want it to be," he said in answer.

She looked lost for a moment, her mind occupied by other things, "What?"

"You asked what we were," he reminded her. "Whatever you want, Kate."

"Castle." She exhaled audibly, letting her shoulders slump just a little and feeling overwhelmed all that had happened. "Not now."

That was better than the _not ever_he was accustomed to.

"No," he agreed, "I know. It's not the time for it, I just … I just wanted to say."

"Ok." She gave him the barest hint of a smile.

Tonight, that was more than enough.


	3. Chapter Two

Author's Notes: Next instalment. No real thoughts on this one, other than to say: I watched _Knockout_ twice through before starting this and I started wondering about what might have happened between the shooting and the funeral. This is the last of the filler chapters though. We'll get to the post-shooting days next.

_Biggest thank you ever_ to each and every one of you who reviewed or favourited or subscribed to this story. I really appreciate all of your feedback. And to the person who commented asking to up the rating, I couldn't tell if you meant I _should_ or you wanted to get to the higher-rated stuff sooner, heh. You did bring it to my attention that I sort of accidentally rated this 'T' when I first posted. My bad. Apologies! Definite 'M'. But you'll have to hold off a little longer for that folks. Sorry.

And finally, happy Castle Monday!

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><p><strong>Chapter Two: The dream-ghosts of two worlds walking their ghost-towns almost address each other.<strong>

The funeral was on a Thursday. She slept fitfully the night before, so much so that at two in the morning, she'd thrown herself out of Josh's bed, pulled on her jeans and walked home eight blocks in the dark. There was no use in the both of them suffering from her insomnia.

It was still cold, for May, though the air no longer had winter's bite. In her coat pocket, she felt the weight of her cell phone and curled her fingers around it, debating internally. They hadn't spoken since first light Tuesday morning in her apartment, when Ryan and Esposito had stopped by before they all gave statements to the New Jersey State Police.

She was avoiding the repercussions of that night for a multitude of reasons. It wasn't just that she had no idea what it meant, how to compartmentalise it or how to move forward from it. There were other things to think about – the precinct was a flurry of activity in the wake of the appointment of a new boss and in the midst of all the chaos, she was still trying to solve her mother's murder.

Not to mention that there was Josh and a certain guilt that had started to gnaw at her insides whenever they were together. A kiss as a rouse on the job was one thing, even if it was the flimsiest of excuses. This was something else entirely, but she still wasn't sure whether confessing their crime was the fairest course of action.

The need to be forgiven wasn't a good enough reason to hurt him.

Then again, perhaps part of her wasn't ready for him to leave her. She sighed, audibly. The air was thick with dew and it came out in a huff of condensation even though the temperature was well above zero.

Castle hadn't been any more forthcoming about his true feelings either, and had begged off the past few days leaving her alone at her desk, something about re-writes that had to be done by the end of the week. Part of her was grateful for the space, and rationally she knew he was waiting for her to invite him back. It was his way of trying to make it easier for her to work in the midst of her grief, but most of her ached for his presence, the way he had of lightening her mood and his habit of reading her well enough to know what she meant when she couldn't say it. And she wished he would call in a way that made her disgusted with herself. She hated feeling as though she needed him, or anyone else.

At the end of a block-long debate she pulled the cell out of her pocket just to be sure he hadn't but it was free of unanswered calls or messages. It was also far too late to call him, at least, if she was going to be polite about it.

She texted him instead. Just, _remember that the funeral is at 10 am_, and she regretted it immediately.

He texted back by the end of the block. _I know. I'll be there as promised. Why are you awake?_

She sighed. _Couldn't sleep._

_No, me either. Need help with your eulogy?_

Theirs would hardly be a Shakespearean affair, but perhaps that was a product of the age. All of her wanted to say yes, and it was far beyond the hour of rational thought. Her hands flew across the keys. _If you don't mind._

_I'll meet you at your place in 20 minutes._

She folded her arms and quickened her pace, concerned he might beat her to her door. In fact, she had time to deposit her belongings in the appropriate places and actually find the notepad with her hastily scrawled ideas for a eulogy. Evelyn had asked her to do it personally, said she wasn't going to be able to keep it together enough to speak. She also pulled off Josh's shirt in favour of one of her own, which said something to her about where her principles were lacking, but she swallowed it down.

The whole week felt like fate, like they were caught up in something so much bigger than themselves, players in the universe's sick drama. She could almost delude herself into thinking that it didn't matter what she did anymore.

The buzzer was unusually loud in the quiet of early morning. She hurried to silence it, in case it woke the neighbours. He appeared in her door way seconds later, but she waited until she'd looked through the peep hole to unbolt the door even though he was expected.

It never hurt to be too careful.

When she'd let him in, she followed him to the sofa. "How are you?" she asked, sinking down beside him on the cushions and folding her legs beneath her.

"Fine, I guess." He dragged a hand across his face. "Sorry, it took me longer than I expected. I've been writing."

"Gina will be happy," she commented, picking at a loose thread in a sofa cushion idly.

"I don't think it's really sunk in yet." He plucked it from beneath her fingers and held it in his lap. "That he's really dead, I mean."

She sighed. "I know."

"How are _you_?" he threw her question back at her. "And how're things at the precinct?"

"Tense." His arm was flung out over the back of the sofa. She reached up and let her hand rest against his, tentatively at first. His eyes observed it, casually, but he didn't move away. She swallowed and his gaze flicked back to hers. "It's quiet without you."

"You haven't called," he pointed out. "I assumed there haven't been any murders."

"Except for the one," she murmured.

"I didn't think they'd let any of you investigate that, even if it did fall under your jurisdiction."

"You're probably right." She curled her fingers against his wrist, experimentally. He reached out and caught her hand.

"Relax," he told her.

The ease with which he toed her physical boundaries was paradoxically reassuring. She found she did actually relax a little, even when he didn't release her fingers.

"Esposito and I may have called in a few favours," she filled him in, "He's assisting in a formal capacity, but they agreed that I would be kept in the loop. Jersey State Police weren't too keen to have me on the case." She made a face that told him exactly what she thought about that. "Because we were there when it happened," she paused. "And because of the links to my mother's case."

"That might be a good thing." He gave her a cryptic look, which she interpreted as a kind of criticism for her methods of late. He was right though, and she hated him for it. She had been sinking in the case after Lockwood, her last lead, had escaped. And now he was dead and Montgomery was too. She swallowed back her retort and let him continue.

"Esposito knows the investigation well enough," he reminded her. "Maybe not as well as you, but well enough, especially as it pertains to Montgomery."

"I know." She pursed her lips. "But you know I don't like to be side-lined."

"Yeah. I do."

They fell comfortably into a lull in the conversation.

"Do you know what you're going to say at the funeral?" he asked her, after a long pause.

She yawned and shook her head, "I have a few ideas. I thought I'd just stand up and be honest."

"Always a start." He rubbed his thumb against the inside of her wrist.

"Why'd you say you'd come?" she uttered quietly, knowing as she did that she was crossing yet another line.

"It can be lonely," he spoke from experience, "At this time of the morning. And I didn't want you to be alone."

"Maybe I wasn't," she challenged, but the passion and volume wasn't behind it like it once might have been. Her entire manner was muted, as though they were trading secrets and she didn't want to be overheard. Maybe they were.

He narrowed his eyes at her, though, and called her bluff just as quietly. "Why did you text me?"

"I," her sentence was interrupted by a sigh, "I don't know Castle. Maybe I wanted to not be alone with you."

He tilted his head to one side and said it matter-of-factly, "So what if you did?"

"I …" She paused, wondering how many of her cards to play.

It was all unfortunate timing and maybe it always had been. Demming's entrance and Castle's untimely exit the year before, the hot and yes, lonely months of June through August, when she'd met Josh, the first man who she'd met and thought _maybe I could like him_since the ides of May. He'd made her laugh, even after she'd quite steadfastly resolved that she could do without the insights of a certain writer, at the precinct and in her life.

And then suddenly it was September and she _did _like Josh but – and there shouldn't have been one, but there was. And at first, it was fine, because as Castle had once succinctly put it, she was his work wife; they could be partners without her reading too much into it. Just because Lanie liked to tease didn't mean there was anything between them. Except with time, she'd realised that was a neat little lie she had fed herself and him to keep him at a distance. She wished she knew the reason. Self-preservation, sure, but it was more than that.

Maybe it was real, and maybe she didn't go for real, just as she'd once accused him of doing. Maybe it was Josh. Maybe it was easier to risk it for someone who hadn't so firmly installed themselves in every aspect of your life and (if you were going to be privately dramatic about it after a few too many martinis) your heart. Which wasn't to say she didn't love them both; she had recently come to the realisation that she did, which was somehow all the more confusing.

She'd long thought that history was never really history – that was the problem, in love and in life – it all came back to haunt you, even if all _it_ was was twelve months of ambiguous signals and the pressing need to discover all the answers to the _what ifs_.

She wet her lips, realising her sentence was hanging. "I feel like no one else understands. I'm not even sure you do, but…" She half-shrugged, kneeling closer to him. "You can at least imagine."

"Couldn't even come close to the reality," he promised her, "But you can tell me, if you want."

She shook her head mutely. Then, after a pause: "I don't think I could. I wouldn't even begin to know how. It… I need to know. It's who I am; a character flaw, probably. But I feel as though for so long I stopped myself from living because I didn't know why she died. I don't_ want_to do that anymore, but maybe by now it's habit."

"The same reason an alcoholic doesn't drink," he quoted. "I think that's what you called it once."

"I fell into it," she confessed. "A little."

"I know. It was hard to watch."

She bit back her apology, feeling as though it wasn't really owed. She'd never asked him to save her from herself, nor did she want him to. "We were making progress."

"You're so stubborn," he observed, fondly. "But that's why I'm here, to help when you feel like you're falling in, if you let me."

"Are you here?" She looked away, over their entwined fingers, at the opposite wall where her make-shift murder board lay hidden beneath the shutters. "Because the other night, when you came over here saying we weren't going to win it, it sure as hell didn't sound like you were."

"Hey." He dropped her hand and reached out to turn her jaw, fingers slipping along the line of it lightly. He tapped her chin with his thumb. "You know I am."

"Whatever it takes?" she found herself whispering. They were so far from neutral territory. His thumb slipped against her lips this time. She reached up and held his hand in place, just barely kissing it.

"Anything but your life," he swore, "I … Beckett, I can't lose you. I don't know how. And this is me saying this, but I can't imagine it."

She nodded once and held his hand between her palms. "I know. I'm not sure I'd know how to lose you either," she admitted.

"That's a turnaround," he said it under his breath, but she didn't think he was being petty. It was probably a point that warranted some discussion.

"I thought you said you figured I'd always forgive you eventually," she tried, hopefully, but it didn't pull a grin from him. "Castle. We both said things, in anger, that we probably didn't mean."

"_I_meant what I said," he declared. "Maybe not with the way it was said, but the words? Every one."

She pulled her hand free and wrapped it around her body. "I meant some of it too. That doesn't mean I should have said it."

"Beckett, I'm tired of not talking," and he did sound weary of it and a score of other things, as though they were all there in the room, sitting on his shoulders. "There's only so much we can say without actually saying it."

She sighed. "I'm not sure that now is the time, not when we have to bury Montgomery in a few hours."

"No," he did concede her that, "Ok. Read me what you've got."

She startled, but momentarily. Ostensibly the reason he was here, she remembered, briefly thinking that an emotional affair was almost worse than a physical one.

That conjured an image of the two of them on the rug beneath his feet, kissing like she had been reminded they were capable of the night of Montgomery's death. It wasn't as though the thought was new, but she found herself struck by it more often of late, and each time, it more steadfastly refused to let her go.

Licking her lips, she nodded to shift the image and reached for the notepad behind her. That more serious subject matter was immediately all-consuming; funny how her desire could so readily shift to make way for her grief, and vice versa. Perhaps it was just the primal nature of it all.

She tapped her fingers against the lined paper. "He was reminding me of the first night I met him," she told him. "That night, after you left my apartment, I went back to the precinct. And he was still there… just him. He didn't even blink when I told him I wanted you gone. He just said it didn't matter who your friends were, if that's what I really wanted."

He interjected when she paused. "Was it? _Is_it?"

Her expression was sad and the words were bittersweet. "Part of me does." She handed him the notepad and he took it. She wanted to complete the sentence, _but most of me wants the opposite_, but she kept her silence. His eyes were skimming her notes anyway.

She swallowed it all back and continued the story. "And when I told him what you said, about not being able to win it, he agreed. He said there are no victories, not in what we do."

"He was a good man," he lamented. "In spite of, maybe even because of everything."

"I know." Her lip twisted beneath her teeth. "And I can't let one mistake ruin his memory... he was so much more than that Castle."

He reached out to hand her the notepad. The look he gave her was loaded, and she caught onto something in it and didn't let go.

"We all are."

She nodded. "God I hope so."

His hand caught her cheek, thumb trailing across the prominence of her cheek bones and fingers brushing where her hair caught behind her ear. He pulled her closer, until her side was pressed to his, her head resting against his shoulder. At first she was surprised that he'd taken the liberty – it was unlike him – but she welcomed it. She'd never been very good at asking for what comfort she needed, partly out of wanting to believe she didn't need it, and partly out of fear it wouldn't be offered. She reached out and let her hand curl around his knee. Beneath her weight, her feet had started to tingle, but she didn't shift.

They were quiet for a long moment.

In the silence, there was a kind of resolution, or at least the illusion of it. This was another reason she wasn't ready for words; she wanted to hold onto to the only place in her life she had found quiet – unexpectedly and almost ironically – for just a little bit longer, at least until the loss was less fresh a wound. She didn't think she could handle any new ones.

"I'm sorry I kissed you," she whispered.

"I'm not," he said with quiet humour, a huff of air against her hair that approximated a laugh and the curve of his lips into a smile against her temple.

She shook her head in mock-disproval, but the gesture was muted. "You know what I mean. I shouldn't have."

"What? Made me the other woman?"

She grinned in spite of herself. "In a manner of speaking. You don't deserve that. I just… I don't know how all the pieces fit, yet."

"The romantic in me is righteously offended and wants to tell you it should be obvious, but I'm sadly not naïve enough to think it's simple," he let his chin rest atop her head, "To be honest, I don't think the ones that last are meant to be."

"You think it would last?" she asked as though the thought had just occurred to her.

His instinct was to dismiss it, but it did bear consideration. "Past evidence suggests I'm not the best at predicting these things."

"True." She lifted her head to look at him. "But maybe you just pick the wrong people."

"And you?"

She swallowed. "Like you said, maybe I'm just never in it."

"I don't believe that." He was looking at her in a way that made her feel like nothing he could ever say would compare to what was written on his face. "You're reserved Kate and you don't trust easily, but you're not cold."

"I know that." She tilted her head to the side and braced her elbow against the back of the sofa, shifting to unfurl her legs and stretch out her toes. Pain shot to her extremities as the blood flow returned. "But it's not the same thing."

"Maybe not."

She yawned, "And you never answered my question."

"Yes I did," he was being wilfully cryptic and there was a punch line coming, she could tell. "I told you I didn't know. Because I don't, and neither do you; you couldn't possibly," he studied her reaction, and evidently decided he wasn't going to like her answer, because he sat forward and leaned his head on his hands for a moment before turning back to her. "It's late."

It stung, though she knew it shouldn't have. She was feeling a little raw though, with grief and the slow realisation that her mentor wasn't quite the man she had thought he was. It was a betrayal of sorts, and she was still coming to terms with it. And as much as she wanted a quick fix, a distraction, to pour all her emotions into _something_(a case, her mother's murder, another one of those heated kisses that momentarily left her incapable of specific hurt), she knew the only thing for it was time. She ran a hand through her hair, shaking it loose at the ends and nodded. "Yeah. I guess it is."

_Stay_. It stalled somewhere between her mind and her tongue. Instead, she stood and threw the notepad down on the sofa behind her. He followed her to the door.

When he was framed by the door way, she reached out and curled her fingers around his sleeve. "Thank you, for your help."

"Always happy to be of service," he was trying to make light, but was distracted. His expression remained thoughtful.

She took a breath and plunged into the sentence. "After tomorrow, I promise, we'll talk."

He nodded, "We've got the time."

She twisted her head in wordless inquiry.

"Well, we've waited this long." He reached out and pulled her closer, hands slipping against the hair at the back of her neck. She bowed forward, obedient. "Let's just get through the next few hours," he murmured as he pressed his lips to her forehead.

She found herself burning with it, even though it was delicate and brief, long after she closed the door to him and allowed herself to collapse into bed, still clothed.

It was a stalemate to be sure, one they would have to find their way out of, but she was glad that it would be later rather than sooner. Time, that was what they needed, all of them – to forget if not to forgive – and then maybe, she would be ready to confront everything that was changing around her.


	4. Chapter Three

Author's Notes: Thank you to all the lovely people who sent me such encouraging reviews after reading. I really appreciate them all, and I hope to reply to you all soon. I'm so glad you're all enjoying the journey so far! This is _completely _different to how the writers handled the shooting arc on the show, but I wrote it in late May, when Rise was but a twinkle in Marlowe's eye... so completely and utterly AU we go.**  
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><p><strong>Chapter Three: The rules break like a thermometer, quicksilver spills across the charted systems.<strong>

She felt grief as a hollow pit in her stomach and a tightness in her chest, or maybe that was the gunshot wound. There was a brief, blissful moment when she wasn't quite aware of what had happened; she felt the impact and had the oddest sense she was falling, until she realised she was on the ground and then the illusion shattered and the pain started. It was sharp, visceral, and made her breath catch. Her hands, reflexively, had come up to meet the wound but they were too weak to do anything useful; the more she tried to apply pressure, the less they seemed to co-operate with her demands.

Castle was there, silhouetted by sky, his hands all over her but not where it counted. _Stop the bleeding_, she wanted to tell him, _there's time for all this later_. Instead she moved her mouth without speaking, and the last thing she saw before the roaring in her chest overcame consciousness was his face, looking as desperate and as sad as she had ever seen it. That (or maybe it was the bullet again) broke her heart.

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><p>There was chaos around her, but she was unconscious to it all. There was an order to it that she would have appreciated and minutia that Castle would have loved to observe: the plastic crackle of sterile packaging being torn, the clipped orders incomprehensible to the untrained, and the motion that accompanied it all (because they were moving, and everything was happening at once). He wasn't paying attention though.<p>

Lanie was still doing CPR, a nurse waiting at her shoulder to take over at the next cycle and his hands were beneath hers, fingers pressed into the wound, stilling the bleeding as much as was possible, but apparently in a way you were advised against in basic first aid. Josh had told him so. Of all the ERs in all of New York City and they'd walked into his.

(He'd forgive the doctor though; there was one face that would hold in his memory from those minutes that felt like hours, and that was Josh's. He looked like Castle felt.)

He'd done it and everything else at the cemetery in a daze. When Lanie finally escaped Esposito, she hadn't commented, just worked around it with a businesslike air. They were both covered in blood. Lanie was wearing the blue gloves she sported in the morgue – a spare pair she'd found in her purse – but it oozed through his fingers when they pulled him back.

Someone directed them to a sink in the corner of the room. Lanie started to cry, big, body-racking sobs that were accompanied by actual tears, all the emotion of the funeral, the shooting and her best friend lying on someone else's gurney escaping the steely, focussed exterior she'd projected earlier – Doctor Parish firmly replaced by her more human counterpart.

He hugged her thoughtlessly, extremities numb to touch, tingling and was slowly overcome by dizziness and a weakness in his limbs. By the time he was aware of how light-headed he felt, Lanie was already trying to support his weight. He braced himself on his hand, stumbling toward the wall behind them. A faintly pink hand-print, wet and still not clean of blood, trailed down the hospital whitewash.

He came to on his knees on the floor a moment later, Lanie's hand squeezing his. He gripped her fingers for a moment before he realised she was trying to feel the thread of his pulse. He shook his head to clear it and managed to say, with a confidence he didn't half feel, "It's ok, I'm fine."

"I'll be the judge of that." She gave him a reproving look and used her thumbs to prop open both his eyelids in turn. After a few seconds, he felt markedly more conscious though still shaky, but she pronounced him true to his word.

"This'll be covered under doctor-patient privilege right?" he quipped, but it was a ghost of his usual humour.

"Castle, I'm amazed you lasted this long." She patted his shoulder. "First time I saw something like that I was out the door and heaving into the nearest garbage can faster than you would believe."

"Thanks for saying it." He half-grinned, "Not sure I believe it."

"Mmm, no, it's true. The dead ones, I can handle. The living ones, with all their parts spilling out? Not so much." He tried to stand but she pushed him down. "No, stay there for a second. I'll get you something sugary."

She returned with a soda and the news that the rest of them had arrived, bar Ryan and Esposito who were giving everyone within a five mile radius of the cemetery hell.

"Thanks Lanie." He drank his prescribed beverage far too quickly, but felt a lot better afterwards. He looked up at the ME with a pained expression. "And Kate?"

Lanie's face fell and her eyes sprung wet with tears. They didn't fall though, just hovered on the verge as a threat. "They've taken her into surgery. Josh … he's up there watching, they wouldn't let him in, but he says it's touch and go, and it will be for a while. He said the damage is pretty bad – fixable, if they can control the bleeding and get to everything in time, but it's not guaranteed."

"Nothing is guaranteed," he said bitterly, pulling himself to his feet and dusted his hands on his knees.

Lanie tried to give him a reassuring smile and it had the air of something she'd learned at medical school. He nearly teased her that it was lucky she'd become a pathologist, because it wasn't particularly convincing.

"He said he's seen worse Castle." She squeezed his arm and they both turned towards the waiting area.

Alexis flew around his middle, nearly winding him and his mother was at her nearly grown-up heels, slipping an arm around him and resting her head against his shoulder. Jim Beckett was behind them, and there was another face he'd never forget: the pallor and hollowed eyes of a worried father. Their eyes met, but he wasn't ready to face it; he swallowed and looked away.

They all turned and made an odd procession, dressed in funeral black, through the back of the emergency room via a corridor marked _Staff Only_to yet another waiting room, beyond the operating theatres.

It was generic – he found the briefest moment to contemplate why hospitals always were – and sunk into a plastic chair curved to the contours of no human spine. Alexis showed her age and sat beside Lanie, leaving the chairs between them empty. His daughter, it seemed, had inherited a little bit of Meredith after all – she seemed angry in the face of tragedy.

Martha reached out and patted his knee. "Oh darling," she was whispering. Apparently, hospital waiting rooms affected even the most dramatic of divas. "I can't for the life of me think of a thing to say."

"Maybe I got that from you," he concluded his musings on hereditary traits and covered his mother's hand with his own. "It's ok mother; I don't think there is anything to say."

Jim Beckett was at the nurse's station, trying to get an update, but it was too soon. Eventually, he gave up and sank into the seat beside Castle.

A painful false silence settled over the room, underscored by the day-to-day operations of the hospital. Sneakers screeched against linoleum, pens scratched against charts and, in the ICU beyond the heavy wooden doors, the call of heart monitors and hiss of respirators was faint, but audible in the quiet.

Finally, Jim Beckett spoke, "She'll be ok."

Castle nodded, but privately couldn't shake the thought that nobody knew that. Nobody could know that, not even the surgeon holding the knife. He'd thought the time in the ER had felt like an eternity, but he was wrong. It was the waiting that took the longest.

The monotony of the décor and the unnatural quiet allowed his thoughts to take too deep a hold over him. They all sat, isolated by feelings that there was no protocol for expressing. He sat with his head resting in his hands until Lanie's cell trilled.

He looked up and their eyes met expectantly. The medical examiner gave him a small, hopeful smile. "Josh says it's going as best as it could."

"She'll be ok," Jim Beckett repeated, like a looping record; his voice had the same thin, worn quality as an old recording.

There was something overly polite about hospitals. Outside of the maternity ward they were places nobody wanted to be, the halls saw so much grief and personal tragedy, but no one talked about it. There was something worse about muted sorrow. Finally, he stood and walked out without a word or a direction.

* * *

><p>Outside, it was raining. The abrupt shift in the weather was welcome. He didn't care. Hands shoved deep in his pockets, he let it soak through his suit. It was atmospheric. He was relieved to be alone in it. Seeing your own unbearable emotion reflected in someone else, someone you cared about was worse than feeling it in the first place.<p>

He wandered through the small parking lot reserved for hospital vehicles, contemplating the personalised plates with an absentness he couldn't recall ever experiencing before. He wasn't amused by the humorous ones or the narcissistic ones, and he didn't have the urge to scribble any of them down. It was as though everything was happening to someone else. He had the eerie sense of not belonging to his body.

The rain eased to a drizzle.

Properly wet, he sloshed through a puddle to the lone bench left over from the days of public smoking beyond the ER doors. _Thank you for not smoking _proclaimed a tiny plaque affixed to its slats. He turned his back to it as he sat.

He leaned back and closed his eyes to the grey sky as a few single tears tracked down his cheeks. Crying wasn't a release though, and the ache in his chest became almost unbearable at the knowledge that there were inevitable changes coming that were beyond his control.

He'd never been very good at accepting the changes that life brought on the unwilling. And he was unwilling to accept a change of such gravity. As much as he'd been worried for her safety, he'd never really prepared for the possibility that something might actually happen to Beckett. She was almost part-goddess, part-superhero in his eyes and he couldn't bring himself to believe that something as pedestrian as a bullet could stop her.

_People get shot and live every day in this stupid country. _He reminded himself because the alternative really was unthinkable.

The bench sunk under additional strain and he snapped upright, wiping his hand across his face in a gesture feigning weariness that was actually designed to subtlety wipe his cheeks. When he opened his eyes, he was staring at Beckett's paramour du jour (well, week, month, almost-year; he liked to conveniently forget that when it suited him, which was most of the time).

"Hey," Josh offered, far too casually for the moment. "Heard you disappeared."

"Thinking." He shrugged.

"Sure."

"How is she?" The question was the obvious one, but it sprung from him desperately.

"You want the version I gave her father and your family, or the version I gave Lanie?" Josh asked, frankly.

"Your version, your professional opinion. What's the probable outcome and worst-case scenario here?" he answered, immediately. That choice was obvious.

"She lost a lot of blood. You helped with that… not sure if it was brute force or beginner's luck but you slowed the major bleed. The bullet punctured her lung, which is why you saw them put in chest tubes in the emergency department. We had to relieve the build-up of air in the chest wall that was stopping her lungs from inflating. There was an exit wound, but it went in and out near the mid-clavicular line."

He gestured to the area on himself.

"So we were always concerned about damage to her heart. After the pneumothorax resolved but her heart function didn't improve, we took her into theatre. The surgery's going well, better really, than I would've expected – she looks stable, they've repaired the damage to the major vessels and were just starting on the pericardium when I left to give you all an update. It looks … look, it's not _good_; that kind of trauma never, ever is, but she should be out of surgery in a few hours. And then it's just a matter of waiting it out. At this point, there are reasons to be optimistic, but you have to remember, one in four deaths due to trauma are from thoracic injuries. And the damage was extensive."

"How long until we can be sure?" He let his head sink into his hands. "Because I've spent most of this damned day holding my breath and I don't think I can do it much longer."

Josh wilted a little beside him. "I can't say. The surgeons are nearly done, and then it'll be up to her or her body or fate or whatever bullshit you happen to believe in … believe me, I wish I knew. It's killing me. Castle." Castle looked up at him through his fingers and straightened, anticipating the importance of the question. "What the hell happened?"

"What did she tell you, before today?" he asked.

"What do you think?" Josh half-laughed at the idea. "You know what she's like; she's all about the job, but whatever she brings home with her stays hidden. I haven't … I haven't seen her in almost a week. Work got busy – that was all she said."

"The man we arrested earlier in the year in connection with her mother's murder escaped from prison. He killed someone in prison, and a guard soon after. She was investigating."

Castle ran out of story to tell without revealing more of Beckett than he wanted to, to anyone, not without her permission. It felt like spilling all her secrets, and as much as he was invested in the outcome of her relationship with Josh, he didn't want to cause trouble, not really. The choice was hers, it always had been, and he didn't want to force her hand.

"So this was some kind of revenge thing?"

"You could say that," he hedged. "Look, you'll have to ask her for the details. But she's being looking into her mother's case again, and it seems someone isn't too happy about that."

"You obviously know more than you're letting on." Josh was putting pieces together at a rapid pace. "But I won't ask you to betray her confidence. The why doesn't really seem as important as the what at the moment."

"I do have to ask." Josh hesitated on the verge of the sentence, as though he could already predict the outcome and wasn't quite ready to hear it. "Why is it that you know all this and I don't? No, don't answer that. You know the question I'm really asking. Kate says the two of you were never involved, but I have to wonder."

"You and me both," Castle muttered, but he did his duty and left the ambiguity that had shadowed them since Montgomery's death untold. "We're not, not really. Beckett was never interested or if she was, that's not what she said."

It was a lie; they'd been involved since long before Josh was even in the picture, and he knew the truth of it but didn't trust it. He was a writer. He liked to puzzle things out with words, and with Beckett there was so much unsaid. But in his mind, it didn't feel like a half-truth. The past week didn't feel real to him yet. It was something that might've happened to their fictional counterparts; people who looked like them but who acted driven by id. There was guilt, somewhere, but he felt distanced from it, just another emotion he couldn't access. Besides, it was Beckett's indiscretion, hers to tell, and in the face of her possible death, it didn't seem to matter all that much.

"So the books?"

"Overactive imagination." Castle thought he could detect a hint of discomfort with the subject matter beneath the doctor's expression, but Josh hid it well – probably a hazard of the job that proved useful in poker. "And of course, it helps with the details for the mysteries, following her and the team around."

He nearly wrote it down to send to Paula to use as a stock PR statement. Josh bought it though, probably because it was nearly the whole truth. He expected fallout from the admission at the cemetery, but that did not, under any circumstances, need to include discussing it with Josh.

(They got along well enough, if required to mix, and he even _liked_ the doctor to an extent that it made him feel like a prize ass, having feelings for Beckett, being in this complicated mess with her, but the mere idea of _that_conversation was too awkward for words.)

They sat for a moment in fraternal silence, the rain falling in a fine mist. Josh folded his hands and let them hang between his knees. "I know you care about her."

"I know you do too."

"I _love _her."

"Yeah." _Me too._

They regarded each other for a moment, equally sad and equally resigned.

Castle could be, and he'd readily admit it, a petty human being. That came hand in hand with his sense of fun and well-developed relationship with his inner child. And he wrote about gore for a living; he wasn't one to shy away from the uglier of the human emotions. So in the past, he'd been known to be slightly jealous of Josh, in a way he mostly recognised as being the impulse of a Neanderthal.

Since he had a deep and abiding respect for the modern woman generally, and also liked to think more of any kind of encounter with Beckett specifically than dragging her by the hair into a dark cave and grunting at her, he usually did his best to push it deep down inside and deny its existence.

Sometimes, it had a habit of slipping out onto the page on the other side of three in the morning, but he wasn't perfect. And, thankfully, he had a vicious editor. Still, sometimes it threatened at inopportune moments in the doctor's presence. Today, there was no such issue. For the most part, he just empathised. That was the thing about fear and love and the uncontrollable variables in the universe; it levelled men. They were both powerless.

"You should get back," Josh told him. "They're all worried about you."

"I couldn't sit in that room for another minute," he admitted. "Or I would've put my hand through a wall."

"I can't say that I don't know how you feel." He brandished a wounded fist, fresh with antiseptic, flecks of a cotton ball still gracing the abrasions. "Hospital plaster's harder than it looks though. I don't recommend it, especially if it's the money maker."

"Mine are probably insured for less."

"Come on. If you can't stand the waiting room, I at least know where to get the best coffee. Honestly, it's all grades of mud, but there's definitely better and worse tasting sludge."

"I don't think my stomach's strong enough to take battery acid," he said, generously. It was getting far too chilly in the rain, even in May.

They trailed water and the faintest traces of Beckett's blood all the way through the ER.


	5. Chapter Four

**Chapter Four: And the past echoing through our bloodstreams is freighted with different language, different meanings.**

They woke her up in recovery to make sure the anaesthesia wasn't going to depress her vitals below acceptable limits. They had already brought her out of unconsciousness once, but she only vaguely remembered that. It was like being weightless, like nothing from the head down and dizzy from the head up. She remembered giggling, or trying to, flirting with the anaesthesiologist maybe? She'd be mortified later. This time, it was like waking up still drunk. Her senses blunted, the ache wasn't immediate, but it grew steadfast until she felt split open and vulnerable. Her head was swimming too pleasantly for true panic, but the impulse faded slowly.

Someone was telling her not to move. The voice was familiar so she complied.

"I'm going to give you more morphine," said the voice, "Since you've been breathing fine on your own. Everything looks good, and it's harder to get once you're on the ward."

She realised the voice belonged to Josh. That made sense. He was a doctor. She didn't know why she thought it was Castle, or her father maybe? She let the morphine slow her panicking heart.

Recovery was loud but the drugs were white noise and a pleasant, warm sensation flooding through her lower half. She fell asleep again, dimly aware of the pulse ox monitor pinching at her finger.

* * *

><p>The next time she was dreaming. The pain was there, biting from within in a way she had never experienced before, but she wasn't limited by it like she thought she should be. It was far too bright, but even when she raised her arm to shield herself from the light, it made her squint. She was alone and breathing was like fire, creeping from her mouth down through her lungs. Her mother was standing in front of her, repeating words and phrases said by other people.<p>

_It's about you needing a place to hide, because you've been chasing this thing so long you don't know who you are without it._

She tried to look away, but she couldn't. The jumble of words that she couldn't understand echoed in her skull. "Mom?" she tried to ask, but she raised her hands to her lips when no sound came out. Confused, she looked around and saw nothing.

_When you walked into the 12th, I felt the hand of God. You've got it ass backwards. You can't hide from him. The devil just blinked. Are you ok? The special today is serial arsonist. Don't leave me, please._

None of it was right. She furrowed her brow, concentrating, trying to make sense of it.

_Kate. Kate. Kate._

Her name, over and over. Since words were useless, she tried touch, but when she reached out, her mother's image faded beneath her touch. _No_. Everything in her screamed it. _Stay_.

But the disappearing ghost in front of her continued to evanesce. Johanna did say one last thing, and that was right, or at least it could have been; _Kate, I love you_.

Then she was gone and everything was dark again.

* * *

><p>She finally shook the anaesthesia and sedation early the next morning. She tried to move, experimentally, her limbs feeling like dead weight and her chest aching, and immediately regretted it. Stubbornness had always been a character trait though, and Kate Beckett persisted. Eventually, she managed to half-sit and her rustling had alerted at least someone by her bedside that she was conscious.<p>

"Hey," Josh whispered, nodding towards Castle. "Everyone else is asleep."

"Hey." She furrowed her brow, taking in her surrounds.

It was a hospital, that much was evident, but she thought she'd left the days of waking up in strange places far behind her in college. Kate Beckett made no exceptions for medical care - she liked to be awake and in full possession of her senses when doctored. This was why she hated mind-altering medications, even the therapeutic ones like anaesthesia for surgery. They made you so slow.

Everything before the shooting came back to her as her lethargic mind began to turn. "Everyone else?"

"Your dad's outside sleeping because the nurses took pity on him and set him up in a dark corner somewhere but Castle refused to leave. The others went home, but they'll be back as soon as they know you're awake."

"Don't jump the gun." She winced a little at the unfortunate choice of words. "Pun not intended, but whatever this shit is, I make no promises about my state of consciousness being prolonged."

"How are you feeling?" Josh was already in doctor mode.

She could see him reaching for a stethoscope and that was about the last thing she felt up to. She fixed him with a glare. "How do you think?"

"Point taken. But fair warning, they're going to force it on you in about an hour anyway."

"Perhaps in an hour, the entire front half of my body will stop feeling like I'm being stabbed by teeny tiny broadswords every time I move."

"Do you remember what happened?" Josh asked her.

She nodded. "I think so."

"You were shot. Luckily for you it missed the important stuff, mostly. And someone wasn't up on their first aid."

He nodded to Castle in the corner as he trailed off. Beckett made an effort to observe. He was asleep and looked like he'd survived a particularly violent slasher film. Her eyes widened a little in horror when she realised it was her blood.

"Don't worry," Josh hurried on when he noticed the her expression, "They replaced most of it in surgery. You were well on your way to hypovolemic shock, and it would've been a lot worse if your shadow over there hadn't completely ignored proper procedure and stuck his hand in an open body cavity."

"You kind of admire it though," she accused, seeing through his words easily.

The surgeon shrugged, "From a technical standpoint, I'm kind of impressed either by his luck or instinct. The bullet punctured your right lung and caused some damage to the pericardium, which is the protective lining around your heart. It's lucky they got you here so quickly."

By the look on his face she didn't doubt it.

Josh continued after a pause. "You had a pretty convincing tension pneumothorax coming in, as well as cardiac tamponade, which means you were bleeding into your pericardium causing a build-up of pressure against the pumping action of the heart. When that pressure gets high enough, it causes cardiac arrest. Before they even got you into theatre they'd stuck the chest tubes and a twenty-five gauge needle into you."

He trailed off, feeling haunted by it. It had taken them twelve minutes to get her from the ambulance into surgery; twelve very long, very chaotic minutes in which his girlfriend had bled out, chest exposed in a kind of sick parody of other, more intimate moments, in front of him and he'd been powerless to do a thing.

The attending cardiothoracic surgeon had spared him a single glance after he'd finished the paramedic's sentence with her name and told him, in no uncertain terms, to find something else to do with his time. Ethically and practically, he knew it was good protocol so he hung back and let the trauma team do their work but his surgeon's fingers had itched. He was not a man accustomed to inaction.

"They cracked your chest to repair the damage to the pericardium and stop the bleeding so you've got a chest drain in as well as the thoracostomy tubes. They'll take them out in a few days. The bullet nicked one of your ribs and CPR cracked a few more for good measure, so breathing will be painful for a while. If you're up to it tomorrow, we'll want to get you up and walking around. For now though, try not to move too much."

"I don't think that will be a problem." Beckett winced, trying to sit up a little more. "And I'm guessing this is fully dosed on painkillers too?"

He moved his foot to elevate the back of the bed with the electronic controls to help her in her efforts to sit upright. "They've still got you on a comparatively low dose of morphine. It's a balancing act. The less you need the better, because you'll have reduced lung function while you heal and we want to reduce respiratory depression as much as possible, but you do need adequate pain relief or you could go into shock," he cautioned her, "So don't go being too tough. Which it seems you have a tendency to do," he said as he studied her face carefully. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"Josh."

"You never told me you had re-opened your mother's case. You certainly never told me people were getting shot over it."

"_Josh_."

"You could have died Kate," he argued, refusing to drop it. "And Castle's family and your dad were there. Why didn't you ask me to come?"

"I," she paused, shaking her head. Her hair was caked with dried blood; she felt it matted against her cheek. "You didn't know Montgomery. And it all happened so fast."

"Tell me the real reason," he requested quietly, eyes boring into hers.

She winced again, but not from physical pain. It was from what she saw in his gaze, that he already knew anything and everything she could tell him. The pain of each hard-fought pull of air stopped suddenly as she held her breath, her eyes stinging with tears.

"I'm sorry," she managed to whisper, reaching out until her fingers curled around his hand. It wasn't really adequate. She didn't know how or what could be. They'd settle for not enough though; it was a habit.

He looked away. "Me too."

She spent an uncomfortable pause studying the side of his face, trying to read more into the feeling behind his words.

At length, he tipped his head backwards to stare at the regular pattern of the hospital ceiling. He let out a breath then faced her with less tumult in his expression, even managing a half-smile. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have brought it up now. You're here, you're alive. That's all that matters."

She tilted her head to one side and picked up on the change in his tone. Her response was teasing. "You didn't seem very happy to see me."

"Kate," he said, the gravity back in his tone. "You have no idea."

"Were you working? Did you …" She was looking at him with a strange mix of horror and sympathy. "The surgery. Did you operate?"

"I was in the middle of a shift." He shrugged. "My boss ordered me off the floor when they brought you in though. Had to watch from the gallery," his free hand curled into a fist against the woven blanket. He punched it, lightly, but she saw the frustration behind the gesture. "Hospital policy."

At times in the months since he hadn't gone to Haiti, she had found herself gripped with a kind of panic at the weight of what he had given up for her, for their relationship. The fact was it had been easy to ask him to make the choice. In the heat of the argument, it had slipped out and even afterwards, she saw the logic of it. But when he had made it, when he had chosen _her_, she realised that had their roles been reversed, she would have chosen differently. That alone would have been enough to make her second guess herself.

The added complication of a certain writer was just an exacerbating factor. Several truths had made themselves quite glaringly known to her. She had kissed someone else, which might have been a minor discretion, but she knew, deep down, that it really wasn't, because of who that someone else had been, and that Josh would almost certainly consider it a lie of omission to hide the fact. She also knew, without a doubt, that when confronted with her mortality twice in the space of twenty-four hours, first in the freezer and then in the moments before Castle had diffused the dirty bomb, she was glad that it was him beside her. Still, there was something in her that told her to hold back when it came to her partner. It wasn't fear. It was an instinct she had always had. Sometimes she thought they felt too much, if that was possible, that if they gave into it, it would consume them. She didn't want that. Love was one thing, madness was another.

And she did love Josh. It was different, certainly less visceral. With him, everything felt lighter. He reminded her of a younger version of herself, someone she yearned to be again in lots of ways. More than that though, they were so alike. In that moment, she realised it with a clarity that was stronger than ever before. He loved his job, but it was more than that. It was a vocation. It was the need to do something, the inability to do nothing. She was the same. They were saviours of sorts. He saved lives with scalpels and sutures; she did it with a badge and a gun. But they understood that bad things happened in the world and they had to fight them, chase away shadows.

(The morphine must have been making her especially literary, she thought absently. Castle would enjoy that.)

She knew why being cut out of her surgery bothered him so much. She ran her thumb along his knuckles. "I know," she murmured quietly. "How hard that must have been."

He smiled at her, genuinely. It was a quiet moment. "I know you do."

She tugged at his hand. "I'd kiss you myself, but everything from the neck down might protest."

He gave her a sly look, but didn't comment, leaning instead to kiss her lightly. He smirked into it when she opened her mouth against his. "Nuh-uh." He pecked her lip and pulled away. "Nothing that raises your heart rate twenty beats per minute above your resting rate for at least six weeks."

She raised an eyebrow. "And what makes you think you're that interesting to me Doctor?"

"Your heart monitor betrays you Detective."

"Mmm." She gave him a mock-displeased look. "Don't you have somewhere to be?"

His face turned sincere. "I do actually," he said, apologetic. "I was meant to do a round of the ward ten minutes ago."

"Then what are you still doing here?"

Beckett was momentarily distracted by the writer slumped in the plastic chair across the room. It was more than just the prickling sensation on the back of her neck, but she had the sudden sense that Castle was doing a pretty decent job of feigning slumber. She felt uncomfortable and wriggled slightly, ignoring the pain in her incision when she did.

"Making sure you weren't going to try to die on me again." Josh stood and bent to kiss her forehead. "I asked them to put me on night duty tonight, swapped with Anderson, so I can duck in and check on you if you're not sleeping."

She nodded once. "Go, I'll still be here when you get back."

He let go of her hand and hurried from the room. He didn't look back, but she waved at his retreating form with a half-hearted curl of her fingers.

"Castle," she called when the door closed behind him. It came out more sharply than she intended, and even the meagre effort it took to raise her voice caused a stab in her chest. It faded to an ache soon enough. "You can stop pretending you're asleep now."

His head jerked up. "How did you know?"

Her eyes narrowed at him but it didn't last. The animosity they feigned – mostly for the fun of it now, the sting had died years ago – faded almost instantly and they were left staring at each other, intensely.

She thought maybe he was trying to communicate without words, as they so often did, but she couldn't quite understand it. It might have been the drug-induced haze or the new words, harsh and otherwise, that now couldn't be unspoken. Maybe it was just the whirlwind of the past few days, slowly settling in between them like dust. It was time to pick up what pieces they could and jam them back together.

Or maybe not; maybe they could afford to take pause.

She tipped her head to the side and beckoned him closer with her hand, but he didn't move.

Beckett let her tongue dart out and wet her lips as the silence stretched between them. Even the writer didn't have words for the moment, for all that had happened and all that could have. She took a sharp pull of air to calm her overambitious cardiac pacemakers and was stunned when the rest of the muscle protested, the pain and the shock of it caused her to lean forward and break his gaze.

He was at her side immediately, and by the time she had recovered enough to be aware of his presence at her shoulder, she had realised it was going to be a long, long hospital stay. He was going to drive her _mad _with his concern. After a minute, she turned her head slowly and gave him a stern look. "You're going to have to stop that."

"What?"

"Well, I've only been conscious for fifteen minutes and you're already coddling me."

"I am not."

"You're hovering."

He sank into the chair beside the bed, resigned. "Yeah well. You see all this?" Castle gestured to his clothing. "It's yours. Tends to make a guy concerned."

"I heard you did something stupid. I mean _after_ you _stupidly _tried to get between me and a bullet."

"You were bleeding out." He was stubborn. "And … I wasn't thinking of myself."

"You should have been," she said quietly. "You have a daughter. I don't want to be responsible for taking away her parent."

He ran his hand over his face. "God Kate."

The anger, which was easier to process than any of her other feelings, went out of her immediately when she saw just how much it had affected him on his face. She reached out, her hand falling short of his head, and sighed. "Castle."

He looked up. "Are you ok?"

"Josh says I will be." Her hand was still extended, hanging in between them. She motioned for him to bring the chair closer. "Have you slept at all?"

"Barely."

The rubber stops on the chair's legs squeaked against the hospital linoleum as he shuffled it closer. When she could reach him, her hand smoothed the unusual angles his hair had adopted. He reached up and took her wrist, stilling her ministrations.

Their eyes met again.

She cleared her throat. "You should… we _both_should get some rest."

"Are you going to kick me out?"

Her lips quirked upwards at their edges; she shook her head. "I'll leave that to the nurses. For now," she murmured, flexing her fingers against his scalp, "I'm sorry."

"You didn't…" he trailed off and squeezed at her wrist. "It wasn't your fault."

"I know. But you were worried."

"How could I not be? You nearly _died_."

"I'm still here," she murmured, fingers brushing along his hairline. "They put me back together just fine. Hush."

Neither of them commented on the tears. He buried his head in the blanket to hide them and let her stroke his hair, absently.

She knew it would have been wise to mention what he had said to her and in front of all their friends. All their lines were being redrawn, and if she wanted to have any say in that at all, now was probably the time. Once everyone else crowded in there wouldn't be a spare moment until much later, but she didn't know what to say that wouldn't dismiss it but wouldn't turn it into something too big to contain. She couldn't create another mess. She'd done more than enough of that lately, and despite all they'd said, they'd still never really addressed the heart of the disagreement at her apartment.

Besides, did it really have to be a gauntlet thrown? There was a common misconception about those three words, and that was that they didn't bear clarification. That, she knew, was fraught with dangers. There were many ways to mean them, and many more ways to use them carelessly, especially in the heat of a moment. She had the sense he didn't regret them, but Castle had always been the kind to rush in blind. She wasn't in any state to point out the flaws in his grand ideas.

So Beckett remembered - the look on his face and the way all the words seemed torn from him - how could she really forget? But in the end she was a coward.

She pretended she didn't.

Instead, she let her hand tangle through his, squeezing, until they both fell asleep.

* * *

><p><span>Author's Notes:<span> I just wanted to make a quick/hideously long note (ymmv) about POV and the shifts within the narrative. I got a lot of feedback from the betas along the lines of "why have you changed POV _again_?" which is completely valid, but to be honest, I was never going for third person limited here. We tend to stick with Beckett a lot more than the other characters, but because the story is essentially a series of duologues (I think there are maybe three scenes with more than two characters present), I decided not to extensively re-write _around_ the shifts.

I gather that some people find it jarring to move between perspectives like that, but that's okay. It's not meant to be seamless. And I do want the reader to be able to see what everyone in such claustrophobic scenes is thinking and feeling. I really don't see any way around it, other than leaving out details I think the reader needs. Anyway, I've been reading a lot on POV in third person narrative and I don't think there's any real hard and fast _rules_but if it's bothering you or you have any opinion at all, feel free to weigh in. My gut feeling is that the story would actually be weaker without it (though my betas disagree).

Thank you as always to all those reading and sharing your thoughts. You're wonderful.


	6. Chapter Five

Author's Notes: I'm sorry it took so long to update. My betas pointed out that Chapter Seven needed reworking, so I cut it into little pieces and shoved it into Chapter Six, but then this one needed reworking around that. Good news is the next chapter is mostly done, bad news is Chapter Seven has been gutted so severely that it needs a word transplant. Le sigh. All of this would be fine if I wasn't cramming like crazy going into the end of my first year of medical school. So, sincere apologies. I hope it's worth the wait.

And thank you so much for all your amazing feedback! I've really loved hearing some of the things people have had to say about this little story. I will reply to all of it, I'm just swamped right now, but don't mistake me, it's all appreciated. (I'd print it out and frame it, if that wasn't weird and a little narcissistic.)

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Five: We're out in a country that has no language, no laws.<strong>

The first day post-op was a circus of doctors and friends and her small, mostly non-genetic family coming and going. She was hazy and didn't really have the patience for some of them, but at least the ones who knew her best didn't linger too long and if they did, they demanded nothing of her.

Her father was her first visitor and he didn't stay long. Jim Beckett nearly cried with relief when he saw she was awake, and collapsed into the side unoccupied by Castle with a few shaky sighs. She felt his lips press into her knuckles.

"Katie," he whispered.

"I'm okay dad." She squeezed his hand and gave him a small, reassuring smile.

They had somehow managed to repair their relationship into something like what it had been before her mother's death, but they still sometimes struggled with things beyond the ordinary. She had parented him for nearly half as long as he had parented her and part of her couldn't forget that. And while he'd asked and been granted absolution by a higher power, as a father he was yet to truly forgive himself. He was clutching his chip from AA in the pocket of his other hand. She didn't have to look to know.

"I love you," she told him.

"I love you too." There were tears in his eyes when he looked up at her. "But you have to let this go."

"Not you too." Beckett tried not to scowl, but the hint of it was there. "Dad, we're so close."

"I can't lose you." He sat upright and patted her hand, fingers coming up to pinch the bridge of his nose. His eyes were closed. When he opened them again, she'd managed to school her expression.

"I won't be leaving this bed for some time," she told him, "We can talk about it later."

"You're right." He let go of her hand and stood to press a kiss to the top of her head. "But you have to learn to accept the things you can't change."

"Are you going to a meeting?" She followed his train of thought.

"I need to. They run one downstairs. I'll be back as soon as it's done."

She nodded. "Thank you."

"What for?"

"For coming yesterday. It… it meant a lot to have you there."

"You're not a child anymore." His hand was resting on her shoulder. "That doesn't mean you're not my daughter Kate. I know it hasn't always been true, but I'll always be there when you need me. You don't stop being my little girl just because you're not a girl anymore, not to me."

"Oh dad." She felt herself want to cry all over again. It was going to be a long day of that, she could tell.

"You try and get some rest sweetheart. I'll be back soon."

She nodded, mutely. He hadn't called her that since she was seven years old. It felt strange.

Beside her, Castle snorted in his sleep and she remembered he was there with a start. One of her chest tubes caught against her hospital gown as she moved and she shuffled uncomfortably until it fell back into a less painful position. Then, worn from feeling and warmed by the small smile on Castle's face in response to whatever he was dreaming, she let herself doze.

About an hour later, on their way to work, Ryan and Esposito announced their presence loudly until they took in the scene in front of them. Beckett stirred immediately and gave them a pointed look. They slunk into the room feeling a little sheepish. Castle was still asleep, face curled into her hand. Her colleagues looked back and forth between them once and shared a glance, but didn't comment and she had never been so grateful.

On the investigative front, the news wasn't good. They'd been ordered off both cases; the nature of the crimes was beginning to make a federal investigation look necessary and the FBI would be taking over. Ryan and Esposito had been packing up all the information for a few days, and surreptitiously omitting anything alluding to Montgomery's involvement. Their new boss sent her best wishes, but also a strict warning to all of them that unofficial investigations wouldn't be tolerated. She wasn't the kind of woman you argued with without probable cause. They told Beckett all of it in a rush and then tried to distract her with anecdotes from the precinct, but it didn't work. She was processing all of it more slowly than usual, but finally told them to cooperate with Gates and the feds for the time being.

"Wait and see who's running the case at the FBI," she said. "Maybe it will be someone we know. Otherwise, wait to get on Gates' good side before you piss her off."

"She already hates us," Esposito groaned. "We're tied up in what she sees as all her messes."

"Does she have a detail on the two of you?" Beckett frowned, concentration elsewhere.

"No, why?"

She raised her hand to her chest and let a finger lightly trace the dressing covering her surgical wound. "This doesn't feel right."

"I don't think it's meant to," Ryan quipped, but gently.

"No, I mean... why just me? I didn't _know_ anything. I mean, not for sure. And if it was just because I was asking questions." Her brow crinkled. "Then you were _all_helping me; they must know that. And until someone gets to the bottom of this, I'd say you were all potential targets. This was a bold move. It was the middle of the day in a public place. Why not wait? You and I both know they could've found a better way. It was brash and it attracted a lot of attention, which has never been their MO before. I'd say whoever's at the top is running scared, and scared criminals tend to get stupid."

"You think he's going to slip up?" Esposito tapped the sheets next to her foot but pulled his hand back suddenly when he realised what he was doing. She smirked a little.

"I think," she spoke as she pulled her hand out from beneath Castle's face as gently as she could manage and made and released a fist, trying to restore the blood flow. By some miracle, he slept through it. She lay her hands in her lap. "That there's a possibility he's got a contingency plan. Castle said to me, before Montgomery died, that everyone associated with this case was dead... well," her gaze flicked over them both, "We're all associated with this case. Talk to Gates. If she doesn't see sense, I'll call her. You both need to be careful. And," she let her palm rest against Castle's hair and she looked down at him while she finished the thought. "Don't tell any of them. I don't want to scare them. But he needs someone on him too. And try to stop him from doing anything _stupid_."

"That's more your area Beckett." Esposito gave her a much too meaningful look.

She narrowed her eyes at him. "Shouldn't the two of you be leaving soon if you don't want to further endear yourselves to our new boss?"

Ryan checked his watch. "She's right."

"Glad you're still kicking Beckett." Esposito lay a hand on her shoulder gently.

Ryan nodded behind him. "I think your dad's waiting outside. We'll tag him in."

"Thanks," she yawned out the vowel.

When they were gone, she nudged Castle awake. He started upright and blinked around, looking slightly more alert than before, but still, far too troubled. She gave him a contrite smile. "Sorry to wake you, but I think it might be about to get a little busy in here. You missed Ryan and Esposito and the nurses, but there are still the doctors and your family and my father ... and Josh said he'd stop by if he could."

His eyebrows flirted with the idea of shooting up at that last, but he fought to keep his expression neutral. "I'm not exactly presentable am I?" He was gesturing to his clothes.

"You could use a shower," she agreed. "And maybe some sleep in a real bed."

"Then who would annoy the crap out of you all day?" he asked.

"I don't know if I'll be particularly good company," she said sadly.

"You need space," he inferred.

"I think you do too." She let her hand start towards him then fall lamely on the sheets beside her leg. It was true. She didn't know how to help him find the perspective he needed. It was the kind of thing she'd always thought you had to do alone. "And on a more practical note, I think I'm going to sleep for most of it."

He opened his mouth to argue, but Martha and Alexis saved her from any more protests. Castle's mother owned the room in the quiet way people often forgot she was capable of. She could be larger and louder than life, almost certainly where Castle got it from, but she also had a depth to her, something that she tapped into in her more legitimate dramatic roles. Beckett had always felt slightly connected to that and even though the actress remained an acquaintance, the few times they had talked, seriously, she had seen someone worthy of her respect.

Alexis, on the other hand, was quieter than Beckett remembered her. She murmured her greeting and hung back behind her father, one hand curling around his shoulder protectively.

The conversation was short and polite, full of the usual well wishes, until they ran out of small talk. The silence invited the earlier tension back into the room. Castle met her eyes, silently asking a question. Beckett gave him the smallest shake of her head, so small that it didn't even look like a gesture to his family. He sighed in response.

"Richard, why don't you walk Alexis to school?" Martha made the suggestion amiably, but the persuasion in her tone was hard to argue with. "I'll wait until you get back. You should at least stop by the loft and change darling." She adopted the seat opposite her son.

He nodded once and Alexis just sighed. "I'm glad you're okay Detective Beckett," she said civilly but her smile was the first genuine one since they'd arrived.

Beckett made a note to ask Castle how his daughter was coping. It was one thing to witness a shooting at twenty after several months of training, having already imagined it a hundred times. It was entirely another to be sixteen and sheltered to the full extent of the horror and violence the world was capable of. She knew firsthand that the experience could shatter your illusions.

When they were gone, Martha crossed her legs and began rummaging in her purse. "I bought you this." She pulled out a modest collection of books and made room for them on the table beside the bed. "I picked a wide selection, including some of the older ones. Richard mentioned you liked to re-read them."

"Oh Martha." Beckett reached out and let her fingers brush over the worn dust jacket of the first Derek Storm novel. "Thank you."

"Don't mention it. We would've bought flowers but not only the hospital gift shop was open at this hour and they were all starting to droop. There's nothing more intolerably depressing than wilted flowers, especially in a hospital room. Now, tell me, how are you _really_feeling?"

"I've been better," she admitted. "But it's not too bad. Josh says it'll get worse before it gets better, when the anaesthesia wears off completely. But it's better than the alternative."

"In the long run, definitely. But don't let that stop you from complaining as much as you'd like in the meantime. Speaking of which, is Richard making a nuisance of himself?"

She shook her head. "No. But I think he'd live here if I let him. And I'm just not sure..."

"Of where you stand." Martha reached out and patted her hand. "Understandable. My son… he lives too much of his life in his own head to really have a sense of _timing_. I won't say any more about it, but I do hope you can forgive him for that. Now, I know people must be hovering in and out and about all day in this place. I can leave you for some time alone if you'd like."

"No, no, it's fine." Beckett still felt a little bit panicked at the idea of being left alone. It was irrational, and she certainly didn't intend to tell anyone about it, but she wasn't quite ready to confront that post-traumatic fear. She swiped her fringe from her face and made a face at how dirty it felt. "I keep forgetting there's blood in my hair."

"That we can fix." Martha was up and out of the room before Beckett even had a chance to process any of it. She returned brandishing a bowl of warm soapy water and two hospital-monogramed towels slung over both shoulders. "It's not shampoo I'm afraid, and we're not to get any on your dressings, but we'll make do."

She moved to sit forward but Martha tutted her. "You stay still. Lord knows it must be killing you to move and it'll go everywhere if we're not careful. Here." She tapped the bed flat slowly with the toe of a brightly coloured heel and lay the tub beside her head. It was one of those surreal hospital moments, where you have to accept help that you might otherwise resist, and she let Castle's mother scoop up the ends of her hair and rinse them in the soapy water. She chatted idly as she worked, telling her some story or another about dyeing an actress' hair the night of a dress rehearsal in an off-Broadway play in the seventies. It was a true comedy of errors, and Martha told a story almost as well as her son. And it set Beckett at ease as best as could be managed.

"Hang on, I'll just change this, it's a little… rusty."

There was a sink in the corner of the room. Beckett shifted enough to see the bloodstained water slip down the drain. She turned away again when Martha approached, unsure of what either of them could say if the situation demanded comment. She realised that's what it was, the hesitation that seemed like awkwardness between everyone who had come and gone – it wasn't what it seemed like at all, it wasn't that they didn't know how to say what they felt, it was that there was nothing to say at all. No words could be adequate. Castle's mother, at least, seemed to prefer actions. That jarred with what she knew about the actress, but she found it pleasantly surprising.

When her hair was rinsed and wrapped in a towel and several pillows were propped between her and the wet patch on the sheets, Martha sat down beside her. "I always feel quite useless in times like this," she confided quietly. "I'm much more at home when the going's good. So you'll have to forgive me if I _do _things. I find I don't have a lot to say otherwise."

Beckett felt her lips curve into a smile. "You've been very helpful. Thank you. Sometimes it's nice, not to say anything or at least, nothing important."

"Well if it's trivial conversation you want, I can help you there. Here, help me pick out colours for my office at the acting school. The only rule is no _beige_, it's dull and common and I won't have any of it. I was thinking apple green…"

She pulled a pile of fabric swatches from her purse and they rifled through them together until Jim Beckett returned from his meeting. And then the younger looked on in amusement as the older Beckett was roped into making decisions about shades of paint. Martha and her father bickered good-naturedly about the merits of _perfect pistachio_over _sassy grass green _until she felt her eyelids begin to fall closed. She had the urge to tell them she could tell they were doing it for her benefit, but instead she smiled at the strange theatre and let it lull her into sleep.

* * *

><p>When Castle showed up at the precinct, Ryan and Esposito weren't quick enough to hide their surprise. The question passed across their faces fleetingly, but he answered it regardless.<p>

"She's sleeping." It was a half-truth, and the detectives could probably tell. They all clung to the lie. "And I wanted to feel useful."

Esposito shrugged. "Not much to do around here. We packed up the case files and sent them over to the fibbies this morning."

"Seems a bit sick sitting around for the phone to ring in homicide," Ryan observed, tapping his pen against the paper hugged by a manila folder. They were working on paperwork. "But here we are."

"No leads on the shooter?" Castle asked, realizing what he'd missed. The shell-shock at the hospital, that temporary break from reality, had been longer than he'd thought. And he'd slept through their earlier brief with Beckett.

He could hear the pause, the pull of air and the hesitation.

"What is it?" He'd detected a hint of a secret.

"Well we're not really meant to be on this," Esposito begins. "And Gates gets her panties in a twist about just about anything… _but_."

Castle flopped down in Beckett's chair. It squeaked in protest and the wheels rolled back slightly. He caught himself against the desk to steady himself then slid over towards Ryan and Esposito.

He leaned closer.

Ryan crowded beside Esposito's computer.

"We didn't have a lot to work with," Esposito admitted. "Crime scene management was a bit of a mess … we're not used to the vics leaving in ambulances in the thick of it."

"Plus it was Beckett," Ryan interjected, quietly.

They all shared a look.

"Yeah," Esposito continued, lost in the middle of the thought for a moment. He found it post-haste. "We were out in the open, so no security footage, and aside from the people at the funeral, there were no witnesses. No one saw anyone leaving the cemetery, but the grounds are extensive, so that's not strange."

"What about..." Castle lowered his voice. "_Montgomery_? He knew it was coming. Any chance he spoke to someone involved before he died?"

"Nothing." Ryan sighed. "We went through everything we could find without raising suspicion, now and twelve years ago."

"We did get a lead though, from ballistics," Esposito said. "It's not much, the bullet they recovered wasn't standard, so only a few places you can buy them legally and a few more who sell them on the black market. It could be nothing," he paused, "We haven't had time to chase it up properly, now that we're off the case."

Esposito looked at the sudden horror on his previously captive audience's faces with some confusion. "What?"

Ryan nodded his head towards their boss, who had chosen that moment to appear at Esposito's back. Her hand was curled around her hip against the fabric of her grey dress suit and her mouth was set in a stern line, matched by the furrow between her brows. Iron Gates lived up to the name and reputation that preceded her.

"If you're done gossiping Detective." She sounded more terrifying than she looked, which Castle had seriously doubted was possible before she spoke.

Esposito whirled around in his chair to face his judgement. "Uh. Ma'am."

All three of them searched for a clue in the new Captain's expression, trying to determine exactly how much Gates had heard. She was looking at them expectantly. "_Well_?"

Ryan's head tilted the barest fraction in his confusion.

Esposito repeated his earlier honorific with an inflected question. "_Ma'am_?"

"How is she? I assume you're all talking about Detective Beckett."

There was a collective release of tension - intercostal muscles relaxing, lungs expanding - all silent, but the relief was palpable just the same.

Castle jumped in to perpetuate the fortunate misunderstanding. "She was awake when I left," he said. "She's doing well, all things considered. The doctors say it looks good."

"Good to hear Mister Castle." Ryan and Esposito looked shocked at their Captain's brief display of something like compassion. Gates shattered the illusion with her next words though. "But with Detective Beckett out of action, I'm approaching short staffed which means you two-" she pointed to Ryan and Esposito in turn as she spoke. "Should be busy, if Mister Castle is done wasting your time. I doubt Detective Beckett's condition could fill a novel." Gates, it seemed, was not his biggest fan. "I just got a call about a probable homicide uptown, MEs office has already sent someone up there. Get to work."

They scrambled to comply leaving Castle blinking in the face of Gates' appraising stare. It wasn't quite his first run in with Montgomery's successor, but he had the continuing impression she'd seen him as a liability long before their paths had crossed.

The clack of heels as the new boss retreated to her office reminded him of Beckett.

Ryan turned back as he and Esposito made for the elevator. "You coming?"

Castle wavered, momentarily. There were choices. Beckett was pushing him away, and in the face of everything that had happened of late, of everything he was sure she'd felt and what she'd done and how she'd _needed_him, for a brief wonderful moment (and he was sick for thinking that, he knew), it was his own chest wound. It hurt, and in the face of that pain his first instinct was childish, petulant, vengeful, but he couldn't say if his presence or absence would hurt her more. And besides, when she pushed and he pushed back, in the tug of war of wills, he usually lost. Too much had already been lost. Let her re-group and re-build, pull away. Some part of him did believe it was fate, that she'd come round eventually. He could wait.

"It's something to do bro," Esposito interrupted his thoughts. "We could use your help."

(He was being unnecessarily generous; Castle knew they'd get along fine without him.)

"Sure," Castle nodded once, the physical gesture displacing some of the heavier thoughts.

He followed Esposito into the elevator and watched the numbers light up. Behind him, Ryan reached out and let a hand glance his shoulder briefly. He didn't speak, though Castle thought he might, but it was an appreciated gesture.

Castle rode in the back. The journey was silent, apart from Esposito's customary cursing at the traffic.

Despite wanting or needing (he'd been losing track of the difference lately) to feel useful, the crime scene proved lacking as a distraction. It was the kind of murder that would usually have him spinning wild theories, but somehow he'd lost his usual literary bent without his muse. It felt strange without her, without Beckett, _Kate_. He couldn't stop himself from expecting her to be there, expecting it to be like any other day, his eyes following the curves of her body as she bent to examine details, her coffee order in his hand, her voice issuing commands. Esposito probably filled her metaphorical shoes better than he would have filled her literal ones (and certainly well enough to close the case), but he wasn't as easy on the eyes. And without her, Castle found his mind didn't scramble to fantastic conclusions like it usually did. He didn't have her thoughts on his tongue in their strange synergy.

It felt wrong.

The victim didn't look like Beckett at all. She was younger, blonde, fuller in the lips and hips and (it was minutia, but he noticed) she wore acrylic nails. He couldn't imagine Kate Beckett submitting herself to the chemical air and lethargic pace of a nail salon. They couldn't have been more different, up until the moment that Lanie looked up and declared that the cause of death had been a bullet wound to the heart. She was looking past Ryan and Esposito when she said it, right at Castle. He'd had to swallow down the visceral reaction to her diagnosis.

The obvious Bon Jovi joke stuck on his tongue. It was too morbid, even for his tastes, at least that day, when it could have been Beckett's body Lanie was examining, could have been an entirely different murder scene. Not when it so nearly had been.

Castle waited until it wasn't obvious or awkward to leave the crime scene physically, but from that moment his mind was elsewhere. He _needed_to see her. There was some part of his brain that was constantly whirring with words, subconsciously organizing them into sentences and storylines that only became conscious much later, but at that moment, his mind was as quiet as it ever was. It was his chest that rebelled. It was tight with what he recognized as fear, what remained of the panic of yesterday. Beckett was alive and he wanted to see it, to truly believe it.

There were still too many things that could go wrong. (He'd been playing doctor on Google to pass the time when she was still unconscious after surgery.) And as much as he could trust her word that they would talk when she was ready, he couldn't trust her ailing body not to fail on them both. Not yet.

He wandered six blocks across town with his hands in his pockets fighting the urge. It faded, eventually, to a throb behind his temples, his heart still hammering in his chest.

She wanted space.

He scowled at the thought.

Space was the last thing he wanted, the last thing he was convinced they needed. He wanted to crowd her, to feel her pulse, to fill the space between her fingers, to trace the unfurling slope of her chin, the curve of her back and her healing chest, all of it, to reassure himself that she was real and breathing. He needed to _know_she was alive. He needed to know lots of things - what she remembered, if she was avoiding him because of his words at the cemetery, when he was begging her not to die, what all of it meant.

Castle had been more patient in the pursuit of Kate Beckett than he ever had been in his life, but now he felt every second like a countdown. It was like the day they thought a nuclear bomb was going to explode in the city. Though the scale of the tragedies differed by orders of magnitude, the feeling was the same. He had the suffocating sense of dwindling time. There were words he couldn't say building behind his tongue and the desperate thought that they couldn't waste any more of it, that the timer was getting closer and closer to the end of something. _All our lives are countdown_, he thought to himself absently. _Must remember to write that down_.

He fought with himself all the way back to his study, but in the end he gave her what she'd asked for. Somewhere along the line it had become impossible to deny her, even when he wanted to.

Instead he busied himself furiously typing and deleting sentence after sentence, writing and discarding page after page of introspection. It was too dark for Nikki Heat, Gina would probably take to it with her nastiest red ink, but it begged to be written.

In the midst of it, Jim Beckett texted an update that soothed some of the tension in his chest.

He wrote until he was distracted from the rest.

* * *

><p>After his shift, Josh returned in time to watch Beckett spoon the hospital food from one side of the tray to the other without eating any of it. He went for her chart, partly out of habit, but halfway through the motion he became conscious of it and did it anyway. She was looking at him, her eyebrow twitching to arc, whether in true irritation or simple exasperation, he didn't know. He hesitated, but her expression held neutral; she indulged him, for a moment.<p>

"It looks good," he told her, when the inspection was done.

"It doesn't really feel as good as the doctors keep telling me it looks," she admitted, wryly. "Then again, I didn't really expect it to."

"It was major surgery Kate, to repair major trauma. It's going to take time to heal."

"This morning, you mentioned something about six weeks?" she said, hopeful.

"Six to eight, and probably a lot more than that before you really don't notice it day-to-day."

She let her hand trail over her torso, from between her collarbones to her stomach, in a masochistic move. It didn't really _hurt_, but it didn't help. She sighed. "Patience has never really been one of my virtues when it comes to injuries."

"Somehow that doesn't surprise me." Josh twinkled at her, far too amused. If it were Castle, it would've irritated her, but on him it wasn't provocative. He had this way of making her feel whatever he was feeling, like his emotions were infectious.

Maybe that was why they'd survived as long as they had, she thought darkly. Certainly, it had begun as a kind of friendship, really. They'd both been disillusioned and misery loved company; it had been somewhat accidentally that they'd fallen into a relationship. And, if she was honest, she'd never really expected it to _last_, partly because she was always wary of placing too much faith in men but mostly because he'd always been going to Africa or Haiti or some Third World backwater next week or next month. There was always a deadline. But the deadlines had stretched. And she'd found she didn't really mind him coming and going for a long time, until she did.

Then he'd surprised her.

He was looking at her, curious but trying to hide it. "What is it?"

She shook her head. "Nothing important."

He briefly looked like he didn't believe her, but it passed. She was thankful.

"Tell me," she said, setting down the fork after pushing the peas on the tray to the other side of the plate one by one. "How do they call this food?"

"It doesn't seem right, does it?" He helped her push the tray away. "I see you've lost your shadow."

The amused smile she'd been wearing failed her. "I sent him home."

Josh looked the tiniest bit pleased at that. She felt uncomfortable, but he didn't comment further, so apparently that conversation could wait for another day.

"And your father?"

"Well he couldn't _live_here," she pointed out. "I sent him home too. He hadn't slept and I'm fine and it's not good for his back to sleep in a chair night after night. I told him I'd still be here in the morning. And the next morning. And the morning after that."

"And there's that patience again."

"It's just… the walls are very white and nothing happens here. I'm bored already."

He nodded towards the books Martha had left her. "I see someone is trying to amuse you."

"Martha," she offered by way of explanation. But she hadn't been able to make anyway headway reading any of them. As much as the books of Richard Castle had been a salvation in the past, now the stories just reminded her of him, and she was distracted from the words on the page wondering what he was doing, thinking, feeling at that moment. She had sensed his dissatisfaction when she'd asked him to leave, and what worried her most was that it wasn't anger, it was just resigned hurt. She hated that, hated her capacity to cause him pain, hated him a little bit for demanding so much of her when she had nothing to give, and most of all, hated her wounded body.

Beckett sighed.

_Naked Heat _was on the top of the pile, her literary counterpart taunting her as a silhouette on the cover. That she couldn't bear to read. The mere thought of his fictionalised version of their lives, where things between writer and muse were far simpler, was too much. Knowing the author as she did, she couldn't quite crawl into the story and hide there like she once might have.

Besides, she remembered Josh's words from the morning, _nothing that increases your heart rate_, and there were definitely _parts _of the book that did. That could only be worse in light of recent knowledge.

(She knew how he felt beneath her tongue. She knew that he loved her, enough to say it. It filled her chest, much like her bleeding heart had, similarly breathtaking and painful in an exquisite way. That perplexed her. Surely she should feel joy.)

Josh interrupted her racing mind by curling a hand around her wrist. She felt the purest kind of guilt, the kind that she'd avoided before when her mind had freely supplied excuses. At first, it was okay because she hadn't made any promises. And then it was just that Castle was her partner and they barely hovered on the edge of _maybe_. It wasn't unfaithful, not beyond reasonable doubt, so she let herself off on a technicality. Now there were no technicalities left to hide behind, but in the depths of grief she'd forgive herself almost anything. Picking herself up off the floor of the warehouse had been indescribably difficult. She'd allowed herself whatever helped.

She saw it now for what it was, or what it would have been if these things were simple: selfish. But it wasn't simple. Was it any less reprehensible to hurt Castle for Josh's sake? The labels she had affixed to each relationship were peeling, refusing to stick. And did the term used (_friendship_ or _relationship_ or _partnership_) really change the truth of it?

Beckett was certain of one thing: she was too battered, physically and emotionally, to keep walking that philosophical high wire. She knew that whichever side she fell, someone would be hurt by it, and she would too.

Josh didn't press her for her thoughts, possibly because he sensed he wouldn't appreciate them. Instead, he sat with his hand curled around hers until she spoke.

"I'm sorry." She let her dry tongue reach out to her lips. She meant it in lots of ways and decided to let him choose which one.

He looked up and caught her gaze. "What for?"

There couldn't have been a better lead-in if it were scripted, but she ignored it. She was too tired for a real, difficult conversation.

"Not being better company," she answered. "And for getting shot, for not telling you that was a possibility."

"You _knew_?" He blinked at her, released her wrist and sat back in the chair.

"No." She shook her head and spoke quietly to appease him. "Well, not the full extent of it." (That was an understatement and a half.) "If I thought for a second that the threats were specific, _real_... well. I knew they'd come after me if I kept looking into the case, eventually. I just thought it would be in a dark alley in the middle of the night, and I thought I'd be able to fight them. I didn't expect a bullet in the middle of the day with forty witnesses. Despite what everyone I work with might tell you, I'm not reckless enough to want this."

After that there really wasn't anything to say. Josh lingered on the verge of a sentence awkwardly, so she rescued him. "Still. It's a hazard of the job that I'm used to. I didn't think that for you, this might be new."

"Not new enough." He reached out and let his fingertips rest against the sheets, just barely glancing her thigh.

She followed the motion with her eyes and let her hand fall from her lap down beside his.

"But I'd be a hypocrite if I said I didn't understand the appeal of a little danger every now and then." She was still staring down at their fingers. He waited until she looked up to continue. "Just... try not to make a habit of needing my services."

"Can't afford to," she quipped, some of her usual humour returning.

He grinned. "I'm sure we could work something out."

"I'm not sure what kind of payment plan you have in mind, but I get the feeling most of your ideas are going to be off the table for a long time." Beckett frowned and bit into her lip, thinking about the case and her job and the long, slow road ahead. Illness didn't become her. She sighed. "You'll probably hate me after a few weeks of it."

The joking moment had turned serious again.

When he spoke, it was to make a single, soft declaration. "Kate, whatever happens, I promise I could never hate you."

She hesitated for a brief second before taking his hand. "Thank you," she answered simply.

After that, the room was quiet until the nurses came around to take her vital signs again. They dimmed the lights on the way out, but Josh stayed. (Years of working long hours and taking long haul flights meant he could sleep pretty much anywhere.) She could sense him beside her while she slept, fitfully, waking intermittently from incredibly vivid nightmares. His silhouette and soft breathing were comforting in the dark.

It was better than being alone, she thought, then chided herself. That had never been a good enough reason. She struggled internally with the burden of indecision until she fell again into a dream that felt real. Castle was there, at her back but not touching her, his voice warm in her ear. _If you're asking the question you already know the answer._


	7. Chapter Six

Some Notes: I'm quite sorry this took so long. (As I've previously whinged about I'm two weeks from medical school finals. But also, I just keep changing my mind about the order of scenes. Anyway, this is a lengthy chapter, so I hope my wordiness makes up for the lag between updates. This one is mostly just a series of conversations that needed to happen, with one exception/twist. As I've mentioned before, I wrote this before _Rise_ aired, but I did have the help of quite a few spoilers, so you can attribute any similarities to that. And for those that are sick of Beckett-in-the-hospital, I apologise. She will be discharged eventually, but unlike on TV, in my stories, people have to spend some time recovering from major heart surgery. Side note: I feel sorry for Josh at the end of this one. _Sigh_.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Six: We're driving through the desert wondering if the water will hold out.<strong>

The days passed far too slowly, each the same way that it had come. On the third day, when she was feeling stronger, she meant to phone him, the buttons were beneath her fingers, slowly pressing, entering his number, but somehow she never managed to make the call. The morning came and went, and the shadows of afternoon followed, the vertical blinds at the window casting patterns against the white walls, and then the light faded, and the nurses came back for the phone, pleased to have found it, thinking it misplaced. She surrendered it reluctantly.

Her father had been keeping her company since lunch time, and he saw it over the tops of his glasses. She met his observant gaze as the nurse left.

"Kate," he said, folding the newspaper he'd been reading.

She swallowed. "Don't."

"Okay." He knew when to retreat, but offered one simple piece of advice. "It's not as hard as you think it is."

(What Jim Beckett had noticed, the few times he'd met his daughter's partner, was how easy they were in each other's company, how unguarded she was, even if she didn't know it. It was what endeared Rick Castle to him most, that and his quiet, patient admiration. It was impossible to miss and he wondered how his otherwise extraordinarily perceptive child could be so myopic. Then again, he thought, maybe we all have our blind spots.)

He was probably right, Beckett thought, reaching with a sigh for one of Castle's earlier works, that he'd once called lesser, and turning the pages over with her hands without really absorbing the words. It felt hard though. Everything did. Breathing was painful. Anything beyond that seemed a world away, insurmountable. She wasn't used to resignation, didn't like it, felt she should fight it but didn't have the energy.

_Tomorrow_, she resolved silently. _Tomorrow is another day.  
><em>

.

But the next day she was undone, just as before.

* * *

><p>Another Castle came to see her on Tuesday, nervously shifting the weight of her school books from one shoulder to the other. Beckett was perched on the edge of the bed when Alexis appeared in the doorway, hovering awkwardly on the verge of the room like she was unsure of the proper protocol.<p>

She knocked, belatedly. "Can I come in?"

Beckett nodded. "Actually, you can walk with me. I'm allowed to."

They did a lap of the floor making small talk – the exertion made anything else impossible – until Beckett decided she'd pushed herself far enough past what was advised by her doctors for one day. When she was resting at the angle that was most comfortable, trying to ignore the pain in her ribs on each inspiration, she turned to her visitor and gave her an inquiring look. "I'll admit, you were so quiet the last time you were here that I hardly expected another visit."

"There's something I wanted to talk to you about," Alexis began, twisting her fingers in her lap, nervous. "It's about my dad." Beckett nodded for her to continue so she did. "I wanted to know, when you're back at work ... are you going to let him keep follow you around?" She finally blurted it out before she lost her nerve. "He's not a cop Detective Beckett. And it's dangerous."

Sucking in a breath, Beckett paused to consider her answer. "He's welcome back, of course. But I know, that it's a dangerous job, and I understand why you have reservations."

"He threw himself in front of a bullet," Alexis said quietly. _For you_ was the silent end of the sentence. They both knew it was a kind of accusation. "I can't... I'm sorry, for you, I really am. And I'm glad that you're alive. But if it was _him_..."

"Alexis." It was imploring, and at her name, she looked up, met Beckett's eyes. "I _know_. If it were him, if it had happened differently, I wouldn't-" she inhaled, sharply and grimaced at the shooting pain in her chest. "I wouldn't know what to do and I'd probably never forgive myself."

"Then how? How can you let him... do that, put himself in danger?"

"If I'd had any say in it at all he would've stayed right where he was," she said, resolutely. Alexis believed it. "But you have to know, I would've done it for him in a second. And as much as you might want to protect the people you care about, love, you can't control them. I wish, sometimes, that you could."

"You really don't think he'd stop, if you asked him?" Alexis sat back in the chair, looked incredulous. "He would."

"You're probably right. But I couldn't do that to him. Not again." Beckett pressed her lips together, once again regretting what she'd said when they'd fought at her apartment. _We're done, now get out_. She couldn't end it again, not after everything that had happened. "I know he's not a cop, but he is my partner."

"And he's my dad." Alexis looked desperate. "And ... you make him reckless."

"I wish I didn't." She meant it too, with everything in her, because it was mutual. She didn't like feeling so completely out of control. "But I'd do anything to protect him."

"Even if it meant walking away?"

"If it came to that." The thought made intensified the tightness in her chest though. She'd falter, but she'd do it, if she had to. "But your father, he has good instincts Alexis. He knows how to handle himself. He's saved my life as many times as I've saved his."

"I know that." Fingers twisting in her lap, Alexis continued. "And I know that you do good work, and I know that things have always worked out until now, but I just can't stop thinking about what will happen when they don't. You must know what I mean. If he'd been a second faster, if that bullet had been a centimetre to the right, one of you could be dead."

"There's something that I've learned," Beckett began cautiously, sensing that Alexis' concerns ran deeper than she was letting on. For Beckett, it had been a hard-learned truth. She imparted it quietly. "There are no guarantees, not in what we do, not in life. Alexis, we're all here one minute and gone the next. It's not easy. I know. Sometimes it hits me so hard that it makes me feel empty. But you have to forget it, or you'll spend your whole life waiting for something that's inevitable."

Alexis turned towards the window to hide her few tears. She'd always thought that she wasn't naive. She'd read a lot, and she'd seen things, she read the papers. She knew, intellectually, that the world was full of hurts. It was different when they were your own, real. They seemed all the more unbearable. When she looked back, she tried to smile, embarrassed. She wasn't used to being overcome by her feelings. Her family was demonstrative, but she'd always been quieter than her father, mother and grandmother. Maybe it was a silent rebellion against genetics. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay. It seems to be going around lately. It's happened to me far too often ever since..."

"The shooting," Alexis supplied. "There's no point edging around the subject."

"No. I suppose there's not."

"If I ask him to stop, I'm afraid he'll resent me." Castle's daughter admitted it quickly, soft. She glanced up, a hint of anguish in her eyes. They were familiar, an echo of her father's.

Beckett suddenly felt at a loss. It had been a long time since Alexis had come to her, for advice, to talk, for anything. She suspected it might've had something to do with the stalemate in her relationship with Castle. When she thought about it from that point of view, what Alexis must've seen, she understood it. It wasn't as though they'd never hurt each other in the course of their partnership despite the best of intentions.

She knew one thing with certainty, "Alexis, he wouldn't. He loves you too much."

"But he loves you too."

Too many people were stating that like a fact lately.

"I know."

"Does he know, that you do?" The way she asked the question made it seem like she was asking a different one.

"He will," Beckett promised.

Alexis nodded. "Okay."

"Does he know you're here?"

She shook her head. "I thought we'd keep this conversation between us. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to be impolite, and I know that I don't know you very well. But you always talk to me like an adult. And I had to know."

Beckett heard what she wasn't asking. "Well, if it's between us, then I can tell you that right now, it's complicated. This isn't the kind of thing you can just walk away from, and just because he's not the one physically wounded doesn't mean that's not true for him too. But I want it to be simple Alexis, I really do." She didn't add her last thought, _I don't know if it ever can be_. Her hopes were bigger than her doubts.

Alexis rewarded her with a reserved smile. "I should get home before there are questions asked about where I am. Dad's probably still tracking my cell, even if he says he isn't."

"For what it's worth, I told him that was a gross violation of privacy."

The teenager shrugged. "I was angry at first, but he does it out of love."

That was generous. "Then you should get going. Thank you, for visiting and for speaking your mind. I know it's ... awkward, sometimes."

"Thank you for hearing me."

"Alexis?"

The words made her pause at the door. She turned back to face Beckett and leaned against the door frame.

"Whatever else happens, what you said, about talking to you like an adult? I promise I always will."

Alexis shifted her backpack from one shoulder to the other, smiling. "I'm glad you're getting better Detective Beckett."

* * *

><p>It was Wednesday afternoon when two monumental things happened in their lives. One was mutual and one became a secret unshared. The latter began when Castle opened the door of the loft to a knock to find the hallway empty and an envelope waiting.<p>

_Mystery delivery_, he thought, mind still whirring with words after a few hours making headway on edits for _Heat Rises_, _nice touch_. But it was what was inside that was most curious – files, police files. An unaltered copy of the arrest reports that implicated Montgomery along with a series of dossiers on a few men he recognized – Dick Coonan, Hal Lockwood and a third – photos printed next to what he assumed was their real identities. And a third, thicker file filled with information on Johanna Beckett, things he knew and things he didn't, and a series of surveillance photos that raised the hairs on the back of his neck.

At the back of the file was another wad of pictures, of Beckett herself. On the back of one with Alexis in the foreground was a message: _don't tell her_, _I can help you_, _but they're watching her too closely_. He dropped them all over the floor of his office and spent a minute breathing heavily before calling Esposito. That felt like a betrayal, but she'd asked for space and needed time to heal, and the photographs were recent. It couldn't wait.

They met (after some debate about the merits of each venue) at the Old Haunt instead of Remy's, take away burgers in their hands. The office beneath the floor boards was largely unaltered, and about as far away from the prying eyes of Gates as they could have managed. After the trapdoor was pulled down over their heads and they'd negotiated the stairs, Esposito installed himself on the sofa in the corner and held his hand out for the files. Castle passed them over and watched as Ryan crowded at his partner's side, both of them taking in the new information.

"Did you see who sent it?" Ryan asked, looking up. (He was a faster reader than Esposito, and kept having to pause at the end of pages.)

"Didn't have a chance. By the time I got to the door, the hall was clear."

"What about security footage?"

"I didn't think to ask to be honest. I called you straight away."

"Good move," Esposito interjected, holding up one of the more recent surveillance photographs. "They're watching her in the hospital. That's _low_."

"It makes you wonder though, doesn't it?" Castle posed the question, which was mostly rhetorical, because he expounded immediately. "If they're watching her so closely, why haven't they finished what they started?"

Esposito scowled. "Don't even say it bro."

"It's a valid point." Ryan said, in between mouthfuls of fries. "Why take a shot in the middle of the day in a public place and botch the job?"

"This sniper was no Hal Lockwood," Esposito spoke from military experience. He flipped open the file and corrected himself, "Or should I say, Jacob Lysinger. I'll give you that."

"Luckily," Ryan commented.

They all took a breath.

"Yeah." Castle was mostly disinterested in the food in front of him, pondering all the evidence. He kept coming back to the surveillance shots. "This must be across the road from the hospital, right?"

He pulled the shot of Beckett with Alexis in the foreground out and lay it between them.

"No doubt," Esposito agreed. "I'd say five, six stories. The angle's from above."

"Do you think you could check it out? If they were watching, what's to say they're not still?"

"We can't on Gates' watch," Ryan reminded them both. "But there's always after hours."

"Nah, not worth it," Esposito argued. "A surveillance guy's not going to be watching a hospital at night. What would be the point? Unless they're waiting for someone specific to visit, but Beckett's seen all of us at least once."

Castle managed to suppress a grimace at that. He wasn't sure he liked being the only one who wasn't free to visit her.

"We could stop by this afternoon," Ryan hedged. "We'll just tell her we've got a lead on the case. It's a residential building. We can always say it didn't pan out."

"You taking up story-telling in Castle's absence?" Esposito raised an eyebrow.

"It could work," Ryan said, defensive.

"As long as you do all the talking bro. That woman does not like me."

Ryan smirked. "I'm not sure she likes anyone."

It was settled.

"If you find anything, you'll call?" Castle asked, needlessly. They nodded.

"Of course." Ryan began ordering the files. "But speaking of the boss, we have to get back."

Castle nodded. "I'm going to look over these again. I'll let you know if I think of anything.."

When they ascended to street level, Castle's cell trilled. He pulled it out and saw one new message, from Beckett: _come save me from boredom?_

Understated, as usual, and nowhere near as much as he wanted to hear, but at least she'd contacted him, and sooner than he'd expected.

Upon realising he wasn't following, Ryan and Esposito turned back and looked at him, expectantly. He caught up. "Message," he explained. "From Beckett."

They all exchanged glances.

"You going to tell her what we're up to?" Esposito asked.

"Should we?" Ryan countered. "Who knows how closely they're watching her? And the message did say ..." He trailed off.

Esposito looked skeptical. "You're getting paranoid bro."

Ryan waved the manila folder containing all their new leads to punctuate his protest. "I think we have a pretty good reason to be."

Castle was silent, thinking it over. They turned to him to settle their debate.

"She'll kill us if she finds out we kept it from her," Esposito stated what they all knew was a fact.

"But it nearly killed her." His words were still thoughtful. Castle continued, "And Ryan's right; the instructions were clear. I'll tell her, eventually, just not yet. We might as well see if it comes to anything first."

"Because that worked so well for you the last time," Esposito muttered under his breath.

It was true, and he knew it, but it didn't sway him. She needed to rest, to heal, to forget about murders and conspiracies, and there was no way Kate Beckett would do any of that if she caught even the hint of a lead in her mother's case. She thought he didn't know her, but he did, at least, enough to know _that _in a way that was almost physical.

"I'm going to go see her." He held out a hand for the files.

Ryan stared at it for a moment before realising what he was hinting at. "You might want to drop those off at home first," he said as he handed them over.

Esposito was quiet, but as they exchanged the appropriate pleasantries he softened. "Tell her we say hi."

"Sure."

They parted ways in the street outside the bar, with plans to meet again that night and discuss strategy.

* * *

><p>When he got to Brooklyn, he stalled. At first it was taking his time in the street, stopping for their usual coffee order at an unusual place along the way.<p>

(He ordered her decaf and resolved never to tell her. He could imagine her face at the thought, but if he was going to smuggle her prohibited beverages, they were going to have a neutral impact on her heart rate and blood pressure.)

Then it was purposefully taking the long way up to the ICU where he was met with a real delay. The nurses recognised him, even though he'd only been there for a few hours, and informed him that Beckett had been stable long enough to move to the Coronary Care unit (_Fifth floor, South block, Ward 5b_, he repeated in his head as he jabbed the call button for the elevator, so he didn't forget). Still, when he found the new location, he lingered outside the door.

Lately, it had been hard not to share things with her. Perhaps he'd shared too much. Still, this new secret was more malignant than the others. He pre-emptively prayed she would forgive him, schooled his features and, balancing the tray carrying his peace offering with one hand, manoeuvred through the door.

Her face lit up above the eyes when she saw him, though her lips bore only a reserved smile. Her eyes had always been her tell; he'd learned it after hours of watching her, at the precinct and playing poker.

"Hi," she murmured. "I didn't think you'd come."

"Why wouldn't I?"

She held up her cell, which was probably forbidden, and he briefly wondered who she'd sweet talked into returning it to her possession. (Josh, most likely. But then again, the doctor might've been a stickler for the rules. Castle could see it aligning with everything else he knew about him.)

"You didn't answer," she explained.

"I'm sorry." He blinked, realising she was right. "I came straight here when I got the message. Didn't think to respond."

She sounded unsure of herself when she said it, like she shouldn't have been asking the silent question. (And part of her knew that was true, knew she had no right to demand an explanation. He was free to do as he liked, and if she wanted to change that, there were other things to change first.) "That can't be true. I sent it ages ago."

"I was-" he paused, mentally chiding himself and hoping she hadn't noticed, "- writing."

"Oh." She moved carefully, but swung her legs over the edge of the bed. "Well, I'm sorry to tear you away from it."

"No." He nearly laughed. "Beckett, if you'd let me I would've been here the entire time."

She looked up at that, hands bracing some of her weight against the mattress, ready to push her to standing, and paused. _Too much_, he thought. It wasn't quite a deer-in-the-headlights moment, but it was close enough.

Beckett recovered almost as quickly as he had from his slip up; the difference was, Castle noticed hers. She knew it, so talked to distract him. "I know. Look, I learned a new trick." She stood and held out her hands in a gesture that said _voilà_.

He grinned. "Giving them hell?"

"I don't think they'll be sad to see me go."

"I don't think they're meant to be."

She laughed, really, actually, in a way he had almost forgotten since the shooting. And for the first time since his hands had been covered in her blood on a day that was far too bright, he actually _believed _she would be okay; that things could be normal again, or at least, some approximation of it. Grinning himself, he stepped forward and set down the coffees on the shelf behind her. He tugged at her sleeve, holding out one arm in invitation. She rolled her eyes, but let him fold it around her, barely resting its weight against her shoulders. Reaching out, she braced her hand against his chest, pushing back to keep them apart enough to spare her ribs.

"It's okay," she said. "This way you won't hurt me."

It was far too practiced.

"You're becoming expert."

"You learn to adapt pretty quickly." She let her head fall forward until it rested beneath his chin, fingers sliding along the gap between his buttons. "How are you?"

"Better, now," he said, quietly.

(But there was some part of him that knew it was wrong, that he should tell her, that she wouldn't let him close like this if she knew he was hiding it from her. Maybe that was why he didn't.)

She nodded once and sighed it out. "Me too."

"I can see that." His hands came to rest on her shoulders as she stepped back. "You've got far fewer tubes in you."

She smiled and braced her ribs with one hand in a way that would become familiar to him. She held out the other and he steadied her.

"It's getting easier," she said as he helped her back into the bed. She shuffled to one side and patted the space beside her. "Come on, sit here. I'm getting sick of towering down at people sitting in the chairs."

"Speaking of, where's your father?"

She waved her hand. "In some meeting with his accountant. Finding some way to make his money make money probably."

"In this market?" He reached out and procured their coffees, handing one to her.

"He has a talent for it." She hummed her appreciation and murmured her thanks as his fingers glanced hers against the paper cup. It was warm beneath her hand.

"I'll have to consult his expertise."

She smirked. "Somehow I don't think you've got anything to worry about there."

"No," he agreed. "It's sick, but this has actually improved sales. Gina's probably twisting around in a desk chair stroking a Persian cat and trying to contain her joy."

"I thought the split was amicable?" She raised an eyebrow.

"Oh, it was. But I've always seen her as a criminal mastermind. Don't get me wrong, it's a compliment. She's shrewd. And she goes for the jugular when she has to, which is actually an underrated quality in a publisher."

"Less underrated in an ex-wife?"

He smirked. "Definitely."

It was subject matter they usually avoided. He was surprised to find that it lacked the awkwardness of their initial, stilted conversation. "In many respects, she brings out the best in me. Marriage was not one of them."

Beckett smiled, a wide stretch of her lips that didn't show teeth but was incredibly genuine. "You know, I have a hard time picturing it, you, married."

"Believe me, sometimes I wish I did too. It was ... you know, when there's a moment that you want to prolong, draw out, preserve forever, but you know you shouldn't, because stretching it would break it? It was that."

She quirked her head. "I think I know what you mean."

They were quiet for a moment, until she told him about her unexpected visitor. "Did Alexis tell you she came to see me?"

"No." He was surprised. "Maybe she knew I would've pressed her for details. What did you say to her?"

"A few things that I should have said a long time ago," Beckett responded, cryptically. The mystery of course piqued his curiosity, but he didn't have time to press her. She continued, "How's she doing?"

He sighed. "How would I know? She barely speaks to me."

She left a hand resting on his arm. "She's sixteen. Believe me, it's a miracle you made it this long without receiving the silent treatment."

"It's a little more than your run-of-the-mill teenage angst," he pointed out. "You know, in her defence."

"I know that." She squeezed his arm. "She's right you know. This job is dangerous, and you didn't choose that. Don't deny it." She was amused by the way he jumped to defend himself, but cut him off before he could get a word in. "At first, you were just … _playing_."

"I know that what you do isn't a game Kate," he protested, weakly. "Especially now."

"I know you do." She rewarded him with a smile. "Which is why I didn't say I agreed with her. I … I trust you Castle. For a long time I didn't, I'll admit, but now? I wouldn't let you out there with us if I didn't think you could handle yourself. But it doesn't always go the way we'd like " she gestured to her torso " if you needed evidence, and you can't blame her for worrying after what she saw."

He sighed. "I know."

"But I think I understand your side of it as well. You know, my dad wasn't thrilled when I decided to become a cop."

"Well _that _I understand." He paled slightly, imagining his own daughter regularly putting herself between criminals with guns. "I'd much prefer it if Alexis became a bored trophy wife or a corporate lawyer with a desk job or, God forbid, an actress or almost anything else."

"Well," she said. "Do you want to know what I told him?"

"That somebody had to do it? That nothing he could say could make you change your mind?"

She smiled. "Probably all of those things, and a lot less eloquently, but no, I told him that I was an adult and I could make my own choices and that he didn't have to like them, but he was my family, and that meant he had to accept them and accept me for what I was."

He raised an eyebrow. "And that's what you want me to tell me teenage daughter?"

She shrugged. "She's not a kid anymore Castle. She's going to be frustrated if you want one rule for yourself and another one for her."

He sighed. "You're right, on so many levels. She's still talking about starting college in the fall."

"You have one of the brightest, most mature kids I've met," she tried to reassure him. "And by some miracle, she's turned out sensible even with you for a father. If you want her to trust you not to make mistakes when it comes to shadowing me, you're going to have to extend her the same courtesy. I'm not saying you stop being her parent. God knows, you think you know more than you really do at that age – but you need to start letting her figure out how to be an adult."

"Stop being so wise." He looked at her sideways. "I've done this for a lot longer than you and you're still better at it than I am."

"It's a lot easier at arm's length," she promised. "But I speak from some experience."

"And I've always valued your perspective and input." He reached out and touched her arm. "I'll be sure to thank you in my father of the year acceptance speech."

That brought up a whole _new _set of anxieties. She pushed them aside and forced herself to enjoy the moment of wordless appreciation. Beckett reached up and peeled his fingers from her arm, twisting hers around them as she did, and letting their hands fall against the sheets. She held on for a moment too long and forced some levity into her tone, even as her thoughts remained serious."Speaking of your family, I know you'll want to lurk around here all evening, but you do need to go home."

"I've been home for days," he protested, "Showered and slept and everything, as per your request, which is more than I can say for you."

"They won't let me get the wounds wet yet." She made a face.

"Does this mean that when they kick me out the nurses are giving you sponge baths?"

Beckett gave him the usual eye roll. "No, they make me do it myself. And no, I don't need your assistance. Which brings me back to my original point: you can't just sit around here all day."

"Why not? That's what I do remember? I follow you around, pull your pigtails, solve crimes single-handedly –" (it drew the snort he was aiming for) "– write novels based on my observations."

"Well this is about as interesting as watching paint dry."

"Disagree."

"I'm _fine_. Well, except for the omnipresent boredom slowly driving me crazy."

"Slowly?"

"Watch yourself writer."

"I'd rather watch you." He chanced it.

She didn't answer, except to curl her fingers around his wrist where it rested against his thigh. They'd never been overly physical and he was more accustomed to just-barely-not-touching than _this_. It sent an unexpected current through him that skittered across his skin when she let her thumb traverse his forearm. He stared down at her hand even after it stilled.

"Don't you need to keep writing?" she asked.

It was true. There was a deadline looming if the book was going to be released by the end of the summer, but somehow he'd made more headway than he'd expected. "I could do that here. You could read it, first pass."

She pursed her lips but her eyes widened a little. He noticed, saw that she was really considering the implications of the offer, but let her scold him. It was habit when everything else was unfamiliar.

"Richard Castle, are you _bribing_me?"

"Well. I know you're a fan."

"Gina'd have your head."

"You're trustworthy."

"Not to mention that it might hurt Alexis' feelings."

"She's making it no secret that she's not my biggest fan right now. Besides, she's far too busy trying to finish high school early to edit. And an extra set of eyes never hurt."

"You're serious." She realised it suddenly and her teeth sank into her lip for a pause. Her hand unfurled from around his arm and she pulled it across her body, hugging herself.

The _as a heart attack _that could have followed seemed tasteless, so he just nodded.

"You don't have to do that," she said, at length. "Invent some excuse to be here or at the precinct anymore, or at least, I didn't think you did."

(There was a reason and they both knew it, but it went unvoiced.)

"Besides, I thought you were helping Ryan and Epsosito with a case."

"Closed it days ago, and you know how I feel about paperwork. I think they're working something else at the moment, but they know I've been writing and it's open-shut so they're working solo."

She smirked. "So you're only in it for the interesting ones now?"

"Beckett." He paused on the verge of continuing, wondering how much it was advisable to say. "It's not as fun without you," he admitted, finally.

"You might have to get used to that, at least, for a little while."

"I know."

"Thank you," she said quietly, "For not pushing. I know it's not really in your nature."

He shrugged out his answer, unsure of what to say. Finally he settled on, "If it's what you needed, then I'm happy to have done it."

"Still. I'm sorry if it wasn't easy for you." She was getting good at telling the time of day by the light from the window and she suddenly realised they'd been talking for a lot longer than she'd thought. "You should get going."

He nodded. "Okay."

He didn't move though, except to reach out and tuck her hair behind her ear, fingers brushing against her cheek a little as he did. "It's good to see you."

She nodded. "You too."

He made it most of the way to the door before she stopped him with his name. "Castle." She waited until he was facing her to continue."I'll see you tomorrow."

Her quite smile drew an answering one from him and he carried it all the way back to Manhattan. It wasn't until he was traversing the long shadows of the towering buildings that he remembered the cryptic clue someone, somewhere had added to their puzzle. It sobered him. He couldn't help but wonder if she'd still be smiling if she knew.

* * *

><p>Josh's pager loudly and persistently interrupted their conversation. He scrambled for where it lay on her abandoned dinner tray, but it clattered to the floor, sending a triple A battery rolling under the stand beside the bed. The pager fell silent immediately.<p>

"Well that's one way to shut the damn thing up," she teased.

"Effective, but crude," he muttered. Cursing, he knelt on the floor and fished for it ineffectually. She looked on, silently amused. "Was it important?"

"I don't know," he scowled, clipping the battery back into place and pressing a button until the screen lit up. "You lose the page if the battery falls out. I'll have to call them." He sighed and fished his cell from the pocket of his jeans. "I'm sorry."

She shook her head, "No, no... at least one of us can still do the job that they love."

He smirked. "Is a bullet the only way to convince to you take a vacation?"

She rolled her eyes but didn't respond; he was already listening to the line ring. The call was on the shorter side - an intern needing advice about a deteriorating elderly patient - and ended with a curt, "Call me again if she doesn't improve. I'll stop by and check on her in half an hour."

Kate had started to pick up on 'hospital time'. Most medical jargon remained a mystery she had no intention of solving (Castle, on the other hand, was probably making notes), but she was beginning to understand the way people used words that outside the hospital walls meant something else entirely. For example, if Josh said he'd be there in half an hour, that meant it could be fifteen minutes and or it could be sixty. If he was going into surgery, 'tonight' meant 'the early hours of tomorrow morning'. When Einstein said time was relative, he'd probably been spending a lot of time around doctors. (She never held it against him, because she sympathised; she had a bad habit of losing track of the clock when she was working too.)

He ended the call and sat back down beside her, noting her expression. "What?"

"You can go now, if you have to."

"No, it's fine. It's his first term out of medical school. He's nervous. It's just upstairs, if I need to run."

The pager once again announced its presence. He stared at the screen. "God I _hate_these things. That was one of the best things about working in Africa." He leaned over and kissed her forehead, "No interruptions. This one, I do have to take. But fingers crossed for all involved it's a quickie. I'll be back in ..."

"Forty five minutes?" Her eyebrow tracked upwards in wry amusement before she could stop it.

"Half an hour, tops."

She smirked and held up her fingers in a small wave. He was gone soon after, which gave her time to think, something she definitely did not need more of. She was processing what had happened in her own, Beckett way. That involved putting in a box with a tightly fastened lid and stacking it somewhere deep down, beside all her other past hurts. This one went right next to her mother's murder and immediately began collecting dust. She flexed her hands against the hospital blankets absently. Perhaps it wasn't the most strictly _effective_method of dealing with violence and loss, but it kept her together, and that was what was important.

She was just about to pick up the magazine she'd discarded earlier, offended by the intellectual insult that comprised the content, because something was better than nothing, when a delicious aroma found her from outside the door. She perked up, slightly.

"Hello?" Lanie entered the room with her eyes pinched closed dramatically and peered at her from between her fingers. "Oh good, you're alone. I never know what I might witness if I barge in uninvited and unannounced."

She gave her friend a look, "Trust me, _that _is not on the cards any time soon. I still have trouble properly gesturing when I talk."

"But I see your oculomotor function has been perfectly retained," the ME observed in the face of the trademark Beckett eye-roll. "Save that one for Castle; I brought you dinner."

A paper bag was promptly deposited atop the sheets. She peered inside with barely contained eagerness. "Oh Lanie." She fished out the flimsy takeout chopsticks and snapped them apart. "You shouldn't have."

"Oh I know I shouldn't have. Tell the nurses on me and I'll kill you. But I've seen what they try to pass up as food in this place and it does not cut it. Pass me the kung pao chicken; that's mine."

She held the containers a little closer to her chest, "Only if I can have a piece first."

"Are you holding my dinner hostage?" Lanie's words did not match her actions. She lounged lazily in the chair Josh had vacated and stretched while her friend procured several pieces of kung pao chicken from a cardboard carton.

Beckett held it out as well as she could manage when she was done. "To what do I owe this unexpected pleasure?"

"I can't just stop by unannounced on my way home from work to see how you're doing?" Lanie teased.

"Way home from work? You must have a case."

"Castle didn't tell you? I thought he'd be right over to talk it over with you, like always, and you'd have solved it by morning."

"He ah... he's been busy," she said, with an egg roll poised halfway to her mouth. "Family stuff."

"Hmm, yeah, and he's not the only one that smells a story. So what is it?"

"Alexis isn't too pleased that he wants to keep following me around now that my day job involves close calls with bullets," she tried to keep the tone light, but she knew it was a rational concern. If it wasn't for her own, selfish reasons, she'd agree with the teenager.

And Esposito had updated her earlier: the FBI hadn't made any headway in tracking down Lockwood's boss, and because Montgomery and Lockwood had shot each other, there was very little need to keep the case open. Lockwood had been smart; without revealing Montgomery's involvement in the shooting of Bob Armond, there wasn't a lot to suggest that it had been a targeted killing, merely an arrest gone wrong.

To her team, who knew better, it all reeked of spring cleaning. Her own life was one thing, but she wasn't ready to risk the lives of her people... or Castle. She scowled into her takeout at the complex tug-of-war of feelings he'd always instigated that had only grown worse since the shooting. Swallowing all that down with a mouthful of food, she chewed, contemplating her next words, anything to get Lanie off _that_scent. "She's probably right, but the point is moot. I'm looking at desk duty for the next few months, at least."

"And Gates won't go easy on you like Montgomery might've," Lanie assured her. "Javier has been bitching like a thirteen year old girl about how much she's a stickler for protocol."

"Hey, with me out, someone's gotta be." She was grinning at her own unnecessary jibe. Ryan and Esposito were more than capable of running the unit by themselves, and it was probably about time they had a chance to prove it to the higher ups. "What else have you heard about the new boss?"

"Eye on the political prize," she shrugged. "But you gotta admire a driven woman. There'll be growing pains, for sure. That kind of thing never makes you popular with the lifers. There is one thing you should know," Lanie hesitated.

"What?"

"She's not too fond of Castle. At least, I was told first impressions were not good."

Beckett smiled faintly. "Well, he tends to grow on you."

Lanie raised an eyebrow. "Is that what we're calling it?"

"Like a fungus," she confirmed, "Or a cancer."

That last one was a hell of a lot more accurate, she thought. Everything was going fine until something shifted and suddenly, it began growing out of control until it replaced all the normalcy you used to enjoy. "Tell me about the case."

"Oh _no_," Lanie shook her head, "You are meant to be resting, _healing_. I tell you about one murder and then all of a sudden you've got Ryan and Esposito in here building theory with you until all hours and bringing you files to look over and you're ignoring your doctors and pushing yourself too hard."

"Lanie, they're my colleagues, not my dealers."

"May as well be." She crossed her arms and took a swig of soda. "Besides, _we_have more important things to talk about."

Beckett closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the pillow. "Please tell me this isn't going where I think it is."

"He said it right in front of me." Lanie jabbed her leg through the blankets with her chopsticks, in a move that was probably inadvisable for hygiene reasons and also very, very annoying. "You didn't think it would escape mention forever did you?"

"I was hoping," she muttered.

"Have _you _talked about it? With him, I mean."

She opened one eye and huffed, moving her hair off her face. It settled, feather light, against her cheeks. "Not in as many words."

"Katherine Beckett." Lanie really could scold like no other. Johanna Beckett would have been proud. "Do _not _sweep this under the rug."

She sighed. "It's complicated."

"It always is. But this isn't something you can ignore."

"I know, and I'm not, but ... there are bigger things Lanie. It'll keep."

"For how long?"

She pressed her lips together and folded her arms across her body, thumbs brushing her elbows. "Long enough, I hope."

"And your good doctor?"

Beckett tried to stop herself from sighing. Too much movement in the chest wall was still acutely painful. She'd grown to tolerate it, but it wasn't pleasant. "That's the problem isn't it? He is good, too good for me probably."

"Don't sell yourself short," Lanie raised an eyebrow. Self-doubts, at least the vocalised kind, were uncharacteristic of Katherine Beckett. "What's gotten into you?"

"High speed projectile," she joked.

Lanie covered her smile with her hand. "Too soon for jokes like that," she told Beckett, seriously. "I still haven't forgiven you for trying to die on me."

"You've got to laugh Lanie." She raised a palm to the ceiling. "What's the alternative?"

"Seriously though, this newfound insecurity about Josh, lack of deflection about Castle," Lanie chewed her lip. "Anyone else feel like we've stepped into a world where everything has turned on its head?"

"I don't think we're in Kansas anymore," she quipped in monotone.

"Did your whole life flash before your eyes? Did you code for long enough to do yourself a hypoxic brain injury? Is this one of those facing your mortality makes everything so much clearer things?"

"And you scolded my tasteless humour."

"Oh shush. I'm a little bit serious."

"My brain is just fine thanks, there was no montage, the movies are wrong and _nothing _is clearer. If anything, it's all the more confused. And we most certainly have all stepped into a world where everything is turned on its head. The real question is how do we go back to how it was?"

"Normal isn't something you find," Lanie waxed philosophical. "It's when change becomes routine. And you're going to have to deal with a lot of changes, physically."

Beckett didn't sound thrilled at the prospect. "I'm sick of it already."

"I looked at your chart on the way in." Lanie reached over and patted her hand, awkwardly. They'd never been particularly physical with each other. That was probably her fault, Beckett thought; Lanie was definitely a natural hugger. "They'll be letting you out at the end of the week - would've booted you already if... well, never mind."

"What aren't you telling me?" Her eyes narrowed, detective instincts screaming.

"Well your insurance is good but it's not _that _good," Lanie answered cryptically.

"That little," the sentence trailed off when she couldn't think of a suitable curse to christen him with. "Castle paid for it, didn't he?"

"Well, Josh pulled a few favours too."

Great. Just _great_. She raised her arm far too quickly to tangle in her air and made a face at the pain of it. "Don't defend them Lanie. I'm feeling too _kept _right now to see reason."

"They just want ... you nearly died."

"I know that," she frowned. "Believe me, I know."

"So, when you say nothing is clearer, tell me, how are things more confused?"

"I already _knew _Lanie." She pushed the food away, suddenly completely devoid of appetite. "He didn't have to say it for me to know."

"So it doesn't change anything?"

"Well, no, of course it does. Now we're in a fishbowl." She gave her friend a pointed look. "But that aside, there's no telling what it really means."

"Oh, I think he meant it in the big black and white movie way."

"That doesn't mean a thing. We could be anywhere from _Casablanca_ to _The Philadelphia Story_."

"Your choices are telling."

"Coincidence."

"I'm sure Castle does an impressive Humphrey Bogart."

She sniffed. "You tell him that and I'm sure we'll both live to regret it."

"Probably. And what about you?"

"Well I don't intend to tell him."

"No. It's one thing to know it, it's a different thing to hear it."

"You want to know how I feel," Beckett realised. She sighed. "Lanie."

The look was probably enough to convey it all anyway.

"Well we all knew you were in love with him a year ago. I just didn't know if you knew it yet," Lanie said, ostensibly to lighten the mood, but if anything it made the conversation settle heavier in Beckett's chest.

"You want my advice?" Lanie asked.

"In this condition, I'm powerless to resist it."

"They're both good men Kate."

"I know that. I don't exactly feel _good _about it, but it's not like anyone planned it."

"Ten years from now, who do you think will still be around?"

"That's not really the question Lanie." She picked at the covers, absently. "Maybe it was, a few months ago, but now? I think it's more about who'll still be happy to be around."

"Oh?"

"I don't know if I can ask someone to sacrifice the work that they love for me," she admitted finally, "I wouldn't give it up for him, and I can tell he wants to ask, seeing me like this. But Africa, Haiti ... I think that's who he is."

"And can you accept that?"

"Part of me wants to." She looked up and met Lanie's eyes. "And I think I could. But not for the right reasons."

"You think you could have your cake and eat it too if Josh was taking off for another developing country every six months."

"I'm not proud of it."

"Something tells me Richard Castle doesn't like to share his toys."

"I've never felt more objectified."

"You take my point. Besides, deep down you're more of a traditionalist than you like to admit. You're no Emma Bovary."

She raised an eyebrow. "Since when do you _read_?"

"High school English."

"Oh. Anyway, I know you're right."

"It'll come to you."

"What?"

"The answer, the way forward, whatever. You'll know."

"I was hoping you had a cheat sheet."

"Oh no. On this one, I have no opinion."

"Really?"

"I provide an impartial ear and sealed lips."

"Speaking of, not a _word _to Esposito."

"Please, you mention feelings and his eyes glaze over."

"Despite the obvious lie because that man gossips like a pre-teen that has an air of truth about it."

Lanie waved her off. "Another time. I should get going. Finish your dinner."

"Doctor's orders?"

"The one and only time you'll receive medical advice in favour of greasy Chinese food." Lanie stood, grinning. She hovered beside the bed and then on impulse bent and grasped Beckett in a gentle, one-armed hug. "I know we're not normally the sappy friends," she said, quietly. "But I am glad you're alive."

"Me too Lanie," she whispered. "Thank you."

"I'd say anytime, but God, I hope I never have to do it again." She straightened up and brushed Beckett's hair from her forehead with a critical eye. "This is why I work with dead people."

"I thought it was the charm of their conversation."

"That too." Lanie winked and ducked into the hall, waving behind her.

Beckett wrung her hands and slumped against the pillows. Lanie was right of course; just because a choice was difficult didn't mean that not making it was the solution, or even an option. It was simply one more thing that was going to have to change, one way or the other, and she'd had enough of her life being upset.

There had been a quiet comfort to the slow lull of progress she'd enjoyed until a week ago. Leaps in evolution were always unnatural. She didn't like it. She picked up the stupid gossip magazine and flicked through it, determined to at least think about nothing for a moment more. Equal parts of her were decided and undecided already.

She must've fallen asleep (and really, the highs and lows of Hollywood romance could do that to anyone), because when Josh appeared at her side several hours after she had last seen him, she was dozing. She startled awake though, and scoffed at his apologies. "It's not like I haven't slept all day," she told him.

"Still, it's good for you to rest whenever you get a chance in this place." He looked harrowed and wiped a hand across his face. "Sorry it took so long."

She reached out for his hand, profiling him slowly in her mind. Something had happened. "I'm not going anywhere; I've got the time. What's wrong?"

He let his thumb brush along the side of her hand. "Nothing. Just... itchy feet. It happens sometimes after a tough admission."

"If it was a rough admission why aren't you in surgery?" She watched his face closely and came to the obvious realisation. "Oh."

"Dead on arrival." He squeezed her fingers. "It happens sometimes. I mean, you know that going in. Eventually everybody dies, in the end you can't win."

The echo of Montgomery's words caught her by surprise. She mumbled an affirmative and looked away to hide the tears that stung like pinpricks in her eyes. It was only a moment. She blinked twice and they were gone. Luckily, he seemed to need her to listen more than he needed conversation.

"It's what I hate about working in the city though," he continued, "You just see so many people kill themselves with wealth. It can be ... suffocating. That's why I liked doing the charity work. It puts things in perspective."

That made something sink inside of her, but even as it did she realised one thing with astonishing clarity something she found she'd known all the while she couldn't ask him to change, to make a sacrifice that would chip away at who he was and turn him into a different person, not when it was so much a part of the one she had come to love. And she had been completely honest with Castle when they were waiting for the all clear from the bomb squad in the storage facility, she did want someone who would be there, with her, a partner. Maybe that was turning thirty and no longer being blind to the follies of her youth, maybe it was just coming out of what felt like a long winter, and realising she could still feel like part of a family.

But it wasn't the time for it. He was, physically, a tall man, and there was a largeness about his personality as well that often seemed catching. It was hard, to see him look so small.

He was usually a little bit reckless, and had a lot of passion for almost anything new and exciting. At first she'd thought that would translate to a brief affair he seemed to flirt with most things in his life transiently but she'd been surprised by his loyalty. In the summer, without Castle, it had been easy to turn to that old distraction of the case. Josh had saved her from the depths of that rabbit hole. And he'd reminded her of who she had been before her mother's death at a time she'd really needed it. So whatever else, she owed him a dignified end. She wanted that for something that had been better to her than she had been to it.

The silence had stretched. She pulled his large hands to her lips with her small ones.

"Josh." She said it simply, and her chest _ached_with it, "I have loved you. Never forget that."

The wording was awkward, but he wasn't paying attention to the specifics and let his forehead fall forward, onto the covers.

She let her fingers forge trails through his hair.


	8. Chapter Seven

Notes: I know. It's been more than a month. I have no excuse really, other than the fact that I truly wrestled with this one. Please believe me when I say it's better for the wait. If you've forgotten what's happening - and I would in no way blame you - this picks up during _Knockout_, in which there is angsty and _wrong_ making out between Montgomery's death and his funeral. So far, people have been talking a lot about all manner of things and Beckett is _still_ in the hospital which I'm sure you're quite sick of, but don't worry, discharge is around the corner. As are a few developments between our protagonists that I'm sure you've been holding out for. If you're still reading, I truly commend and thank you and you're more than welcome to clamour for more, or take your pitchfork to me, at the end. ;)

By-the-by, bears some similarity to the canon, which I am stupidly proud of, as it was _entirely_ serendipitous (most of this has been written since late August). Or I'm part-Rogers. Ugh. End humble brag. Sometimes I hate myself. On with the story!

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Seven: Only she who says she did not choose, is the loser in the end.<strong>

Once they stopped doling out the medications that made her sleepy, Kate Beckett was a miserable patient. And unfortunately, as Josh had once remarked to Castle as they crossed paths outside her room, oxycodone didn't seem to make her anywhere near as drowsy as the morphine. They'd exchanged a small, ashamed smile at the joke, but it wasn't exactly uncalled for. It was approaching ten days post-op, and everything was looking better, most of all, the patient's acerbic tongue. Beckett was faintly embarrassed at her behaviour, but she felt like she had surrendered control of her mind to the _trap_that was her body. That not only meant great physical limitation, but it wore at her patience all-too-quickly.

Castle never quite knew what to expect when he made the journey across the river. Beckett _hated _hospitals, which he found he'd always known, in a way, even before her daily espousing on the subject. That morning, though, she was in a good mood and he was aiding and abetting her wilful disobedience.

The physiotherapist had been very clear about the limits that needed to be observed. She needed to be up and walking, but she couldn't push it. He called it 'exercise good, exertion bad'. Kate Beckett had never been one to back down from a fight. She had crossed her arms, and Castle read it all over her body: _challenge accepted_. He had known at the time that it wouldn't be long before she made him her accomplice. And now, here they were, after far too many laps of the hospital room and she was starting to struggle for air.

He propped her up. "Come on. I think you've done enough."

"No," she insisted. "One more."

"Beckett, you could rip a stitch."

"I'll certainly rip something if you don't help me."

"You don't scare me." He looped his arm under her shoulders and pulled her with him anyway. "At this speed, even I'm faster than you."

"You want to race?" she gritted out through her teeth, trying to ignore the pain in her chest which shot out and sank its claws into her with every step.

"Not a competition," he reminded her. "You'll be back to running laps around me in no time… provided you don't kill yourself first, which I'm told is a distinct possibility if you don't –"

"Fine Castle." They had reached the bed again, and she let him use the automatic controls to lower it so she could sit. He liked to play with it, much to her endless annoyance. With the tip of his toe, he kicked it until she was at a more appropriate height, almost eye level.

"Apparently they call this neurology height," he told her while she caught her breath. "A fall from this height is a turf to neuro," he explained.

"Nikki Heat's going to spend a long time in hospital in the next book isn't she?" She had developed a nose for writerly research over the past three years, and if Castle had started absorbing the lingo it was definitely making its way onto the page.

"Maybe." He stood at her knees and gave her a teasing smile. "Or maybe her latest arch nemesis is a serial killing surgeon who takes his work home with him, only at home the patients are perfectly healthy, until he kills them."

She groaned. "Done to death."

"Angel of mercy killer?"

"Mmm." She swung her legs so her toes hit his shins lightly, "Maybe."

"Everyone thinks it's the doctor but actually it's the nurse, getting her revenge on a system that takes her for granted?"

She let her hands fist in his shirt. "Why don't you finish the latest one first?"

"Because that's not as fun," he groaned, "I already know how it ends, I just have to write it. And Gina is on my back about it."

Beckett gave him a wicked look but didn't comment. He followed her line of thought anyway.

She laughed at his answering look and pulled him closer to her. At first he thought she was going to hug him, so he brought his hands to her shoulders, but her fingers worked their way to his collar and tugged his face within kissing distance. She let her tongue dart out over her lips and stared at him. With a hitching breath, the retort died before it left his mouth. His hands travelled the line of her shoulders, slowly, finding the bare skin of her back through the loose ties of her hospital gown.

But even at that, she didn't move, just _blinked _at him, like she couldn't remember how she'd found herself close enough to feel his breath on her cheek.

"Kate?"

She pulled back and released his shirt. "Sorry," she murmured, feeling her cheeks burn. At least she could blame that on the exercise.

"No, don't worry, it's –" His hands were lingering against her back, tracing her shoulder blades. This was how it seemed to work lately – she tested their limits and he took it as permission to take liberties. It was a stupid, dangerous game that neither of them really realised they were playing until they were in the moment. She reached up and tugged at his arm until he removed his hands.

"Don't say it's fine," she grimaced. "It's not." She patted the space beside her on the bed. He sat. "Sometimes I wonder why it's so easy."

He nudged her shoulder. "Fate."

"Be serious."

"Beckett," he sighed out. "What do you want me to say here?"

She let her head rest against his shoulder, still frowning. "I don't know, nothing, probably."

"And how long is that going to last?" He let his head rest against hers. "We keep trying it. It's not working."

"I know that." She bit her lip. "But I can't… I kind of need you right now," she admitted wryly. "So just ... _wait_, please. I know it's asking a lot, but I'm not ready to negotiate any more changes. There's been enough of them. I'm not ready to make a mess of another one."

"You need me, huh?"

"Don't let it go to your head."

"Do you think you could get rid of me?" he joked, but there was a hidden truth in it.

"Well that's true." She elbowed his side and sat upright. "You are incredibly persistent."

"Some people call that loyalty." He shuffled as she moved to sit properly in the bed. "Dedication, fidelity, dependability, constancy, reliability, trustworthiness."

"Thank you Roget," she remarked sarcastically. "I take your point."

"Do you really?" He gave her a loaded look.

She nodded slowly. "I'm still not sure it's the right time for _that_conversation."

She made a face at how hoarse she sounded; hospitals made her mouth permanently dry.

He dutifully reached over to fetch the plastic cup that she'd pushed out of reach earlier. "Here."

"Thank you,"

His hands were warm when she twisted her freezing fingers through his. If he was surprised, he didn't show it.

"We should pick our way through one emotional minefield at a time." She sighed. "So I suppose we might as well get to one of them, since that's about as much locomotion I can handle for one day, and there's been enough small talk. Before Montgomery's funeral, we said we would talk." She winced, her muscles ruing her earlier enthusiasm. He probably thought it was for him though. "Castle, I want us to be able to work together again."

"I sense a but."

"You asked me to walk away." Beckett frowned. "I can't do that. And I don't feel like we're on the same side anymore."

"You know that it's not as simple as that." He reached out and let his fingers curl around her elbow. "There aren't two sides here. It's not us versus them. If it was, you know I'd be on your side every step of the way. But it's reality, not a novel, as you so often remind me. This is complicated, probably more complicated than we know."

"I know."

"And you know better than anyone that they're out for blood. We have to be careful. You know what I was trying to say that night? Finding your mother's killer won't mean a thing to you if you're dead. Closure, all of that? It's for the people left behind. You know that, that's why you do what you do."

She unfurled his fingers from her arm and squeezed his hand. "I need you to know that walking away, it's … it's not an option."

"Sometimes." He met her eyes, defiant. "You have to find another way. So fine, I promise you that when the time is right, I will do anything and everything I can to help you find your mother's killer, but you have to stay alive while we do it. You can't run at it head on anymore. I won't ask you to walk away, but I will ask you to find another approach. Okay? We can be smarter than them, but not if you lose yourself in it."

She let him unfold her arms and hold both of her hands for a minute.

"Fine," she said, at length. "You might be right, at least, in part. I told Ryan and Esposito to back off." She cocked her head. "For now. I'm trying to figure it out, but it makes no sense."

"What?" He searched her face for clues as she pulled her hands free and looked away. "I think they tried to kill you."

"But why now?" Her brow furrowed in concentration. "Why only me? Why not you or Ryan or Esposito? We're all equally as likely to know about Montgomery's involvement and that's the only new lead we've had in months… we wouldn't even have _that_if Lockwood hadn't escaped. They led us right to all of it. There… there has to be something we're missing. And if they were trying to kill me, why didn't they succeed?"

He grimaced but she pressed on.

"I know, they did the job well enough. But they've never had trouble hiring top of the line assassins before and –"

"And a shot to the head would have been fail safe," he finished her sentence. "I know, I've been wondering the same thing."

"And?"

"You know me; I've never had trouble imagining a scenario to make sense of the evidence before, but here? Even I'm coming up blank. It's too big, not human enough, for me to imagine."

She nodded slowly. "I'm in two minds. The longer we wait, the colder the trail goes. But even if we catch the shooter, it'll be Lockwood all over again – no real identity, no prints in the system, no nothing. And whoever's hiring these people has reach.

The words idled between them.

He found himself wanting to say more, about the leads they'd been given and the so-far-unrewarding follow up but the window drew his eyes. He wondered if the omniscient, amorphous _they _were still watching from across the street. It made his fingers itch to close the blinds, but he couldn't think of a way to excuse it. In the end he remained silenced by the part of him that was still afraid for her, for him, by so nearly losing her.

(That part was convinced that even if he couldn't save her from it, he could at least insulate her from that mad need that drove her. The rest of him thought it was unduly optimistic but it insisted. And he'd always had a bit of hero complex when it came to wounded women, always wanted to rescue them, wanted them to rescue him.)

"What are you thinking?" she asked, quietly. "I can almost see it, turning behind your eyes."

"Plot point," he deflected, easily, with a kind of alarm at how second-nature the deception was becoming. "Sorry."

She smiled and shook her head once. "Castle," she said, and the moniker had a weight to it that demanded his attention. "I want you to know, I can let it rest, for now. Already have, in a way."

"Really?"

(And it was the single, shining perfect moment to tell her about the files, the photos, all of it, but he was afraid it would change her mind.)

Beckett nodded. "For one thing, I'm told things aren't exactly as … relaxed at the precinct without Montgomery in charge. For another, no one else needs to get shot."

She saw everything in him relax with relief. "Thank you."

She shook her head. "It's not for you or my father or anyone else. But maybe I understand it a little bit better now. You were afraid."

"Beckett, you have no idea."

"I do," she argued quietly. "It never really goes away Castle. And I hate it because it makes me feel weak but I'm not … done. There are so many things I haven't finished." She felt it catch in her throat and looked away from him in case she couldn't stop herself from crying. She felt his weight shift on the bed and he was tugging at her arms until she twisted and folded herself into the embrace.

"You didn't want to die," he said into her hair. "That's okay. I don't think anyone ever does, or at least, is meant to."

She pulled away, sooner than he would've liked but after longer than he expected. When she'd distanced herself, shuffled to the furthest corner of the mattress and pressed her hand to her cheek, Beckett glanced over at him, wondering why it was so easy to go to him and so hard to stay. The old arguments seemed hollow, but the new ones had yet to take their shape. Still. She folded her arm across her body. "Well I didn't."

"What?"

"Die."

"No."

She saw just how much he struggled to mute the smile that spurred and her throat tightened a little. The knowledge that she could hurt him, really hurt him, twisted through her. She had the burning urge to change the subject, but she came up blank. Miraculously, he did it for her.

"I haven't forgotten." Castle paused in the middle of the sentence until she frowned a little, unable to tell what was meant to come next. "About the book," he finished. "About how I said you could read it."

"Oh." She relaxed, but barely. "I told you that you didn't have to. I won't hold you to it."

"No, it's nearly done. It's just…"

(He looked self-conscious for a second and she nearly made a face at herself when she realised she just how much it endeared him to her.)

"It's just not quite ready," he told her, finally. "Don't want to disappoint you."

"You couldn't," she promised, nodding to the copy of _Hell Hath No Fury _resting beside the bed.

His eyes widened at little at seeing it. "My mother?"

Beckett grinned. "Yes. But it was sweet of her Castle."

Running a hand over his face he reached out and flipped through to where she was up to, read a few sentences before closing it with a soft _smack_, clearly communicating his disgust. "I'm almost tempted to try to buy up every copy and have them burned."

She reached over and took it from his lap, smoothing the dust jacket beneath her palms almost protectively. "I liked this one," she told him, simply. (He puzzled over it in the seconds before she explained, because it didn't seem very _Kate Beckett _of her, to like a novel about the occult.) "I mean, you've written better since, but I liked a lot of the contrasts you made. They were … starker, than in the later ones. And I think you used to be less self-conscious about your word choices."

Her eyes glanced up to find him transfixed and she nearly laughed. Of course, _of course_, Castle would _like _to talk about his own books.

"I think that sometimes you were a little braver," she finished, before it could go too far to his head. "I mean, on the whole the polish makes them better. But it's nice sometimes, to re-read the ones that are a little rougher around the edges."

The truth was that _Hell Hath No Fury_ was the kind of thing she'd put down if she opened it in a book store. Derek Storm had always been more her style – the killings were outlandish, sure, but the prose was more restrained, precise, immediately gripping. (She could tell, reading the earlier work, that he'd learned not to run on as much over the years.) But it was the last novel her mother read before she died. Actually, she'd found the dog ear halfway through the penultimate chapter. It was one of those absurd thoughts that sometimes cut through grief, but she still remembered it clearly, feeling intolerably sad that her mother had never finished it, never got the missing piece of the puzzle.

There was a single line at the close of that penultimate chapter that always spoke to her, that she thinks her mother would have liked:_Adam smiled at the horizon and its fading light, his long nose casting orange shadows in the face of another sunset. "That's all you can do. Pick up the pieces from where they've fallen and rearrange them as best you can."  
><em>  
>She had re-read it far too many times, just for that.<p>

She narrowed her eyes at him, but he'd seen her momentarily serious expression. Her words were teasing. "You're going to be insufferable now, aren't you?"

"The writerly ego is very fragile Beckett." He gave her a wounded look. "It needs all the praise you can spare it."

"I have a hard time believing that any of your egos are fragile," she told him.

Absently, Castle wondered if it was a reference to Freud. Probably not. In that respect, he was probably far too ruled by id.

He sensed that she wasn't telling him all of it but didn't press; usually it was best to wait her out and she'd tell him eventually. Evidently this was one of those times. She looked up, and hesitated. He heard the slip of air.

"What?"

"It was the last book she read before she died." She held it up with her fingers marking her place.

"Then be sure to tell her I'm sorry," he remarked. He was looking at her gently though, encouraging.

The comment coaxed a smile out of her, as he'd intended.

"I'm surprised actually." She was giving him a much more familiar look, all shark going after prey and he knew she had an insult waiting. "Pulp fiction wasn't like her. She preferred _literature_."

"Beckett, you wound me. Then again-" he eyed her slyly "- at least you don't share her preference."

Well that was true. She'd read a lot of more high brow novels in high school and college (in fact, she'd been toying with the idea of an English major in that first semester at Stanford) but after she'd come home and thrown herself into a psyche major and then, the academy and the job, she'd been too exhausted to handle anything heavier in the time she stole to read. She glared at him just the same.

"Hey." He nudged into her leg with his fingers. "I appreciate every single one of my fans. Especially you, because you know better but you read them anyway."

"You have an overactive imagination, but you've always done your research, despite my endless protests."

"The lady doth protest too much, methinks."

She was pleased that he'd quoted correctly, but it didn't show on her face. "Don't push your luck Castle."

"You _have _been unusually nice this afternoon." He pondered over it. "Why the good mood?"

She held up her wrist to show him the last cannula. "We're down to the last tube, and they're not using it for anything."

"Planning your escape?"

Beckett grinned. "Oh yeah. At least, I'm hopeful."

He smiled, said it softly. "I am too."

* * *

><p>She and her dad both looked up from their respective reading material at the knock on the door.<p>

(Jim Beckett spent most of his time keeping her company which she appreciated more than she might've thought before the shooting. They'd always been able to be in each other's presence quietly; her mother had always been the one to drive the conversation. But their own ways of handling grief had strained their relationship. Silences had become absences. The shadow of it still sometimes sat in between them. But after her brush with death they had found a calm. It was easy. And she was grateful.)

Castle was looking back at them, half in and half out of the room, the arm not still in the hallway curled around something that sparked her interest, at first because she thought he was bringing her a case from the precinct to look over and at second, because she realised it was the writing he had promised her.

"Can I come in?" he asked, rhetorically, but still waited until she nodded to cross the threshold completely.

"Of course." Beckett let her book rest against the hospital blanket cover-down. (She'd finished _Hell Hath No Fury_, or rather, skipped over ten chapters in the middle and re-read the end before moving on to something Lanie had bought her. It was stupidly easy to read - or just stupid, she hadn't yet decided which - and she'd resolved never to let Castle see it. The teasing about chick lit would _never_end.) When her hands were less occupied, she waved him in.

"I brought coffee, for everyone." He announced, setting down both burdens at her feet and handing her the paper cup. It was a familiar ritual in an only semi-familiar setting, but she smiled at it, let her fingers rest against the warm cardboard, always aware that his were only inches away.

Her dad glanced between them and stood up. "I'm going to take a walk with mine."

Beckett nodded at the same time as Castle began protesting, saying Jim didn't have to leave on his account, which earned him a glare.

Jim Beckett laughed at them and raised his cup in a kind of toast as he made his exit. "I won't be long."

There was a beat of silence before Beckett hid her face in her hand. "He's completely transparent isn't he?"

"He _tries _to be inconspicuous."

"Valliant though in vain," she muttered, cursing her mind for catching the lilt of the dialogue she'd been reading all morning. "Don't get me wrong," she continued, refocussing her attentions on the sentence she'd intended. "I appreciate that he's here it's just... "

"There are some things you don't want to have to explain to your father?"

She nodded. "You said it. And he's not asking incredibly loudly."

"He's not the only one."

He muttered it without thinking and he saw the panic that flashed across her face, and the way she froze for a moment afterward and immediately regretted speaking too honestly. In truth he knew that the uncertainty was a necessary evil, that there were more important things than whether or not she knew that he loved her, and whether or not their ending was together or apart. He'd settle for them both _alive_. And that meant unravelling the conspiracy surrounding her mother's death, finding the shooter, letting her recover, physically and mentally. Intellectually, he was happy not to push. But it didn't come naturally, and there were his own wounds that were healing, vivid nightmares and a lack of restful sleep and a growing _obsession_with the murder board in his study; all of it made it more difficult for him to be better than his basal instinct. (And instinct and insecurity, louder, said _push_, said _it's better to know_. Part of him did know. He just didn't trust it.)

She swallowed and extended a hand, about to reply, to smooth things over, but he spoke before she could, changed the subject, adopted a much brighter tone than was necessary.

"I brought you something," he said. After bending to retrieve it, he handed her the stack of pages. "As promised."

She lay them in her lap and let her thumb smooth over the title page. "You didn't have to."

"I know." He didn't say it, but she heard it. _I wanted to_.

She wished, with acuteness, that it could have been simpler. It was significant, the kind of moment that became a memory that stood apart from the rest, but even as it was happening, she wanted to remember it differently, wanted to reach out, run her thumb along his jaw, kiss him, but softly, in a way she never had.

(That wasn't like her, her impulses were rarely tender, more likely to be borne of more frantic desire than deep-seeded affection.)

She sank her teeth into her lip instead, refusing to let him draw her gaze though she could tell he was staring at her.

"I forgot," he said, after a long silence.

"What?" She did look up then, stunned out of her mute emotion by his words.

(Even that had a symbolism to it.)

He procured a red pen from the pocket of his shirt. "For all the things you want to change."

Beckett's hand flew to her mouth to stifle the huff of amusement. "I wouldn't want to influence your authorial voice or vision Castle."

"Really? I would've thought you'd be a 'notes to fill the margins' kind of editor. And I particularly would've thought you'd jump at the chance to make your fictional counterpart more… realistic."

"Unless you mean less naked on the cover, then no, she's realistic enough."

He studied her, trying to decrypt her expression. "Really?"

"People don't read crime thrillers for realism anyway. They're … an escape."

He smirked.

"What?" She narrowed her eyes at his mirth.

"Only you Beckett." He reached over and handed her the pen, letting his fingers rest against hers to take the sting out of it. "Would come home after a long day solving homicides and _escape _by reading books about it."

"In the books it's different, neater, easier. And there's a comfort in that, in a protagonist and an antagonist and a villain, and it all working out in the end. Life is rarely so black and white." She watched his expression. "Not that you don't get the nuances right, at times."

"Just that I get to perfect the ending. I know what you're saying."

"Do you?" she asked, and the question was carrying more baggage than should be expected of two words. She followed up with another, quieter one, which made what she was not plainly saying clearer. "Really?"

"In most ways. It's -" he ran a hand over his face, "- God Beckett. It's barely been two weeks."

"I know." Her hand started towards his but fell short against the woven hospital blanket. She traced the small holes in the fabric with the pad of her finger.

He nodded once, admitted it quietly and deflected with humour. (So he was still there somewhere, the Castle she knew, loved.) "I miss Montgomery, and not just because Gates is ... five letter word, rhymes with witch."

"I know."

"I didn't think... I didn't know him like you did, like the others did, but he was still... I've been thinking about it a lot, about why he tolerated me hanging around the precinct, following you around for reasons that must've been transparent to you, to everyone. And I think he must've seen something in me that you certainly didn't." He paused to smile at her, nostalgic. "But more than that, something I'd started to forget in myself. I was wandering a bit Beckett, back then."

She nodded, and adopted his hushed tone, traded a secret of her own. "I know. I was too... I just, hardly knew the extent of it, at the time."

"Anyway. It's not just you, but you're part of it, it's the work, and it's the team, it's _real _people again, after too long without more than a handful of them, and even fewer that I'd call friends. I feel like I owe him that. I'm just... grateful, more than I can really say."

"He brought me onto homicide you know." It was her way of acknowledging what he'd said, the depth of it. "And not a moment too soon. I was just drowning in it, in my mother's case, in Royce leaving and it was what I needed. I'm not sure if he ever knew how much, but then again, I was always surprised by it, how well he knew me. I think sometimes it was better than I knew myself. And he had this way. He had this way of steering me away from my limits, so gently that most of the time I didn't notice."

"The book," he said, nodding to the manuscript in her hands, "It has to be for him."

She nodded, unable to hide the smile that played at the corners of her mouth. "You don't have to ask my permission or seek my approval."

"Read it," he urged, "First. What you said at your apartment that day, about telling no one outside of us, well, you may have noticed that I have a tendency to write what I know."

Beckett sighed. "If anyone asks it's fiction, your overactive imagination. That's what you've been saying all this time anyway."

It had never be true, not strictly.

"I'd like that," she told him, fiddling with the corner of the first page, wearing it into a crease in a way that would become so familiar that the paper would give way. "And I think he would too. A dedication, I mean."

He nodded, swallowed. "It still feels strange. Ryan and Esposito are happy to have me along, but walking in there, seeing that office but it being Gates behind that desk. It reminds me that it's still fresh."

"Well like you said." She reached for his hands properly, took one and squeezed it once before dropping it back into his lap. "It's only been two weeks. And like the doctors keep saying, it's going to take time for things to feel normal again, for all of us, not just for me."

"I always hated it when people said it only took time."

"As though that were something we all have in abundance," she murmured her agreement.

"I hated it even more when I learned they were right."

She laughed, wryly at first. "The most intolerable platitudes are the true ones."

He amused her for nearly an hour by furnishing her with examples, and her laughter was increasingly genuine.

Sometimes, in those smallest of moments, she forgot where she was and why she was there and each time she remembered it was the slightest bit easier. She hadn't noticed it yet, the change was too slow, but the ease with which they could fall into old habits was comforting. She held onto it; it fed her hope and slowly it became a belief. No matter what happened, they would all find their way eventually.

* * *

><p>In a way, she thought afterwards that they both knew it was coming. In the last days at the hospital she saw Josh less and less, and when he was there, everything felt stilted, full of apologies on her part and silent pride on his. But maybe it was just that <em>she <em>knew, and her knowledge coloured all of it.

Still, she had the sense that it was all hurtling towards an inevitable conclusion, hurt feelings and accusations that she _deserved_ and the end of something that had once been good, good for her, for both of them. But it wasn't what it had been, what she'd once thought it could be. And she knew she couldn't allow herself to pretend _forever_. But one more day never seemed to hurt.

In truth, she knew she was indulging herself, waiting for a moment that was never coming. There was no _right_ time, no _good _way. It was just that this was the last tie to a past, a time that was over. Life is full of changing times. Sometimes they fade, bleed into the new, like summer to autumn, or a year's end and a new one's beginning. But sometimes the shifts are abrupt, winter to spring without the thaw. This one had been. She was still searching for a constant, and she knew (had known, probably, from the beginning) that it could never be Josh, but her instinct was still to cling to whatever was left. In lots of ways, she was used to having him in her life and she knew she'd feel the absence of him when he was gone.

Regret, she was learning, was bitter medicine. And Royce had been right about more than one thing in his last letter to her, there was nothing worse than _if only_.

But _if only _what? She wasn't sure what she would change, or, more precisely, how she would change it. The deck had been stacked and every card that fell had followed the one before.

Fate still wouldn't excuse all of it, if she believed in it. She did and she didn't; she knew that sometimes things happened _to _you, that life continued without your consent. But you chose how to weather the storm. Death, loss, that wasn't a choice, but grief was. And still there were other choices; she wished she had made hers differently.

It had been months, debatably, but weeks, certainly, since the dirty bomb and resurfacing doubts. Then, when it had started to be a mess, it was one she was going to fix, but there had never seemed to be the _time_. They were, all three, bodies in motion, and classical mechanics applied. Maybe this was the external force she had been waiting for, pushing for change.

The light was waning when it came to an unavoidable point, the one where she couldn't avoid it any longer, and even her nostalgic mind couldn't stop her body from betraying her. Josh moved to kiss her, as he must've a hundred times, but for all that it was familiar, it wasn't because she felt differently. And she couldn't stomach it.

Her face was hidden behind her hair when she turned away. She swallowed and opened her mouth to shake it off.

He beat her to words. "Don't apologise."

That drew her attention. She was searching his expression for a clue with her detective's eye instantly. Josh looked worn; they both did, like they were paper that had been folded and re-folded on itself one too many times.

He refused to hold her gaze for long.

"Why not?" she pressed, quietly.

"Because." He tracked the shadows of the blinds, moving slowly across linoleum, cut with brilliant orange, red, fast fading to purple, blue, a cosmic metaphor he didn't truly want any part in.

He looked up, "Kate."

"No." She shook her head but barely. "Don't. Say it."

"Why should I have to? You're the one..." He trailed off into a sigh. "God. Look at us."

"I'm not sure I'd want to," Beckett admitted.

"Yeah." He laughed, in the way people have of finding humour when they have to. He tugged at her hand. "Do I know what you're saying?"

Her throat was tight. She nodded, still staring at the wall, at the silhouette they made.

"It was never going to work," she said, sadly.

"I know that. You were never in it."

She frowned and met his eyes. "That's not true. This isn't about Castle, not entirely. I know you think it is, but it isn't."

"What am I meant to think?" He was exasperated, frustrated, hurt, and plain exhausted. "You let me think there was a lot less to it than there is."

She was definitely guilty of that charge. The look she gave him was contrite. "But still a lot less than you're probably imagining. It's not just that Josh. It's because … we're too alike. I have to go out there and chase murderers. You have to fly across the world and save lives. You think you can give it up, but you can't. You love it too much, more than you'll ever love me. And I love what I do more than I'll ever love you. Sometimes, that means getting shot. And you can't ask me to stop."

"I wasn't going to," he said, but she knew part of him was lying. And even if he never asked, she could tell that he wanted to. It made her feel guilty (more guilty than anything else) and she couldn't carry that around with her forever.

"But you want to," she lamented, "You want to ask me not to die... and I can't promise that."

"No one truly can," he said. He knew, of course, that his words were true. Fate or, more practically, pathology paid no heed to race, creed, age, career choice.

"I need to do this," she told him. "And I think I need to do it alone. Everyone in my life is going to tell me not to, and I'm going to ignore them. I don't want to make you one of them."

"I don't want to be one of them." He was struggling to keep his tone neutral. "I'm sorry Kate, but I don't. I don't understand it. I want to. I always... want to understand you."

"I know." Her chest ached and she brought her hand up to her sternum, but it wasn't physical. She let out the breath that had hitched and held her hand out in between them, wiggling her fingers until he met her halfway and grabbed it. "I'm sorry too."

"What you said, about wanting someone who'd be there." He stared at their knotted fingers. "I wanted it to be me you know. I really did."

"You can't be something you're not," she murmured. "And neither can I. Believe me, it's not easy."

"At least you have someone to ease the blow." From anyone else it might have been a dig, but from him it was just a last regret. He slumped forward and leaned his head against their hands.

"That's not true." It was barely a whisper. She almost choked on it. She felt two slow tears escape from both her and didn't bother wiping them away. "And even if it is, you do too."

He looked up her in silent question, one of his own tears threatening at the corner of his eye. She reached out and smudged it away with the pad of her thumb. "Africa, Haiti, South America." She tried to smile, but she tended to cry in small floods with long droughts in between. There was nothing for it now.

"Don't." He leaned against her hand, "Please. Don't cry. I can't... not if you cry."

"I told you it wasn't easy."

"I know it's not."

She took a deep breath and glanced her cheeks with her free palm. "Josh, go home. Get some sleep. I'll be fine."

"I know you will." He gave her a wistful smile. "Always are. I love you, you know."

"I know," she sighed. "I loved you too." (Because she had, in a way. As much as Castle had accused her of hiding in it, she hadn't really, not entirely. It wasn't just an escape, it was a salve.)

"But."

She nodded, grimaced ruefully. "Yeah. But."

"Damnit." He clenched his hand into a fist and held it to the underside of his nose. "Why is there always a but?"

"I don't know." Her fingers brushed against his five o'clock shadow. "Come on. It doesn't make it any easier drawing it out like this. Just... pretend like it's no different to any other night and kiss me and walk out of here and ... they're discharging me tomorrow," she said. "And we'll leave it at that."

He nodded and stood and bent to kiss her. Their tears were mingling on her cheeks when he pulled away and stalked out.

Beckett stared at the empty doorway until her eyes stung from exhaustion. Then she swallowed, steeled herself to it, and leaned back against the pillows. She closed her eyes to the hospital ceiling and imagined her mother sitting beside her, offering old advice. _It hurts for a while and some of that will never leave you, but someday, you'll look back on it and you'll remember some time or another and it will just make you smile._

She'd been sixteen and didn't believe a word at the time, but it was true, at least, about that particular boy. Some hurts scarred worse than others. She felt the tears return and spill from behind her eyelids and she wished, for the first time in a long time, that she was a child again, crawling into her mother's lap on the sofa and finding easy comfort.

When she finally fell asleep, first light was peaking between the blinds and she dreamed Johanna was wrapping her in a fierce motherly hug telling her that doing the right thing wasn't meant to be easy.


	9. Chapter Eight

Notes: Hi! Look. Relatively timely? And some of you are still reading! I'm flattered? Surprised? Definitely undeserving? I seriously can't believe you've held out so long. THANK YOU.

Anyway, not too much to see here, just some Beckett family bonding and a tiny bit of progress for Castle and Beckett.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Eight: I choose to be a figure in that light.<strong>

At least her surgeon had kept his word about discharging her the following day. It was a Tuesday and she was turned on her side staring at the sun glaring at her through the window when they came with the last of the paperwork. It was as unfair as it was inviting; the weather never seemed to co-operate with her turns of romantic fortune as it did in the movies. She scrawled her name on the last of the papers and handed them back to the nurse.

Her father was waiting with a pink bag with her name on it. Beckett regarded it with a distracted curiosity. "What's that?"

"The things you had on you when you came in."

She gestured for it and ripped it open, the contents spilling across the mattress. They'd cut her out of most of her clothes and they were long gone with the surgical waste, but the contents of her pockets were there, and so was her father's watch. The ring, however, was missing. She picked everything over one more time to be certain. "No, no, no," she groaned in panicked frustration. "It's not here."

"What isn't?" Her father hovered at her shoulder. "They said this was everything."

"Mom's ring." She frowned. "I was wearing it like I always do. I can't imagine why wouldn't be with everything else. Hell, the only other thing missing is the gun, but I assume Ryan or Esposito or a uniform took that." She picked up her badge and ran her fingers over it. "They probably should've taken this too."

"Maybe it was ... misplaced," Jim said gently. "It was all very chaotic for a while there."

She sighed and clutched the guts of the destroyed plastic bag. "I know."

(She didn't though, not really. And while everyone else in her life had a common experience, hers was a unique perspective. It set her apart, and she felt it, but it was a distance she was trying not to dwell on. It felt too much like she was indulging herself. And besides, Castle wasn't the only one who could imagine.)

"Come on." He helped her gather the few odds and ends that remained. "I'll ask at the nurse's station on the way out. Maybe it'll turn up."

She reluctantly agreed.

Lanie had brought her a change of clothes earlier in the day and they felt like an inexplicable luxury, but she still felt a little uncomfortable, as though everyone looking at her could tell what lay underneath. She touched her hand to the dressing. The bulk had decreased considerably since she had first woken up but she could still feel it there, beneath the sports bra Lanie had insisted would be more comfortable than anything with an underwire. Her friend was probably right. She had already started to feel sore where it pressed against her wound.

At least they weren't going through the ridiculous rigmarole with a wheelchair and fussing. As soon as the paperwork was signed, they let her walk out, with her father reminding her every half mile to stop and rest. She scowled when he did; every day she grew more impatient with her physical limitations.

Despite her earlier thoughts, the Brooklyn sunshine was a relief after nearly a fortnight in the hospital. Beckett breathed it in and lingered, falling into one of the benches just outside the automatic doors and squinting up at the sky.

Her father sat next her. "Good day for it isn't it?"

She leaned her head against his shoulder. "You have no idea."

He laughed.

"What?" She pulled back and blinked at him.

"Katie, _everybody _had some idea."

She made a face. "Are you saying I complained too much?"

Her father laughed again. "I think we were all relieved by it… that was the first moment I really believed you'd be okay." He hugged her against his side. "You haven't changed much. You could never sit idle for more than a minute; you always had to be _doing _something as a kid. It drove your mother up the wall when she tried to work from home when you were younger."

She suddenly had the sense someone was watching them. Instincts kicked in, but she tried to hide it: there was no need to panic her father. Goodness knows he'd had enough of that in the past few weeks. It hadn't escaped her notice that he looked tired, the kind of tired that a week of sleep couldn't shake. She glanced around furtively but relaxed when she realised it was just the protective detail they still had on her.

Gates had some ring in from another precinct investigating the shooting, to avoid conflict of interest and satisfy internal affairs. Two cops dead from the same team tended to raise eyebrows and rumours of a connection were rife. And accurate, but she'd steadfastly denied any of it. Ryan and Esposito had been unhappily compliant but no one had resisted as thoroughly as Castle. Without new leads, they would close the investigation by the end of the week, which she knew, but nothing was worth Montgomery's reputation in her eyes, not a sniper who would be another dead end. He had disagreed, said they didn't have to play their whole hand. As it was, he was only play half of his, though it had still escaped her notice. The fear that motivated his arguments didn't though, but she hadn't known how to answer it, to reassure him.

And so, they'd had it out over it on Sunday night, albeit in hushed voices and furious whispers, because it didn't seem_proper_to argue in a hospital. She hadn't seen him since.

Still, she was adamant. It wasn't only the memory of her mentor. There was also the connection _they _had to the conspiracy, and if it were exposed, her life would be harder not easier. They had leads and as soon as she was back to full strength she intended to follow them. Beckett didn't need her new boss stonewalling her while she couldn't fight back.

(There was another reason, one Castle probably would've been convinced by, that whoever was pulling the strings would become even more dangerous with the threat of the truth being exposed, but she still couldn't bring herself to talk about things so plainly. It wasn't just memories that it brought back, but her own fear, and she wasn't ready for him to see that.)

Her father followed her gaze. "They said they'd be keeping an eye on you for a few more days, just in case the shooter decided to …"

"Finish the job," she supplied gravely. "Makes sense. It was all over the papers. They must know by now that they didn't succeed."

"_They_." Her father's mind was turning behind his eyes. "If you think you know who did it why did you lie to that detective that came around?"

"Because," she said. "This goes back to a couple of dirty cops, and I'd hazard a guess we'll be finding a few others before we're done. I don't want to tip my hand. They'll either find the shooter or they won't. If they haven't yet, I'd say he's long gone. That's incidental. There's a bigger game in play – whether we like it or not dad, so don't start about stopping. I don't think we could now, even if we wanted to."

His mouth set in a thin, disapproving line she'd come to _loathe _as a teenager, but he nodded slowly. "I never could tell you what to do."

"I always appreciated the advice you know." She gave him a small, amused smile. "I know I didn't always _show _it."

"I don't know. A few slammed doors and the loud, angry music beg to differ."

"Just because I didn't agree with you doesn't mean I didn't take what you said under advisement. And I have this time too." She finished the sentence quietly. "I promise. That's part of the reason I lied to Detective Phillips. Castle said it best I think. He said we can't run at it head on anymore. And we won't. For now, I'll focus on getting everything back to normal."

Her father gave her a conspiratorial look. "Speaking of Rick."

"I know, he hasn't been around in a few days. It's fine. We just… had a disagreement, that's all. He'll come around. Or I will."

"Not what I was going to say." He was teasing her, she understood it now.

She gave him the most deadly of warning eyebrows. "_Dad_."

"I'm just asking."

"I'm not sure there's really anything to tell," she told him, "Besides, I think we're well past the age where you get to ask."

"Gotta know who to keep my eye on Katie." He was smirking and she found herself amused in spite of herself.

"Yeah well, an eye on Castle never went astray," she said. It was dripping with sarcasm. "Just not for that reason. And for the moment, you don't have to keep your eye on anyone."

"Is that why you've been so quiet this morning? Has something changed on that score?"

"You're worse than my girlfriends, you know that?" She gave him an exasperated look. "Just like Lanie, nose for all the gossip. Yes, Josh and I -" she made a parting motion with her hands, "- broke up. No, I'm not _quiet _about it. It is what it is. You don't have to worry. I'll get over it."

He reached out and hugged her briefly and awkwardly, in that way only fathers could. "I'm sure you will."

She pulled away and cleared her throat. "Now I think I'll go trouble our shadow over there for a ride home. No use paying a cab fare from Brooklyn if we can get more value out of our tax dollar."

* * *

><p>They took the Brooklyn Bridge and she let her head rest against the window, looking up at the arches passing overhead. It was one of those perfect days late in May where it was warm enough to feel like summer but not yet so humid it was oppressive. It was cheesy, stereotypical maybe, but she felt a newfound appreciation for it.<p>

Sometimes still in the middle of the night the weight of it all would hit her and she'd be gripped by panic and grief in equal measure, but she'd learned a long time ago that nothing could break her. After her mother's death, even on the worst of days, she felt a steel to her, something that told her she could withstand it. It wasn't that she was hard – as much as she hid it, the work did still get to her sometimes – and resilience wasn't the same as playing tough anyway. It was just that she had an unwavering self-belief. That mettle had never been truly tested since her mother's death, or at least, not like it had been lately.

In that moment though, she felt at peace with it all. Staring back at where they had come, she welcomed the challenge and turned to look forward at the sun glinting off the glass buildings of the city.

* * *

><p>Her father installed her in her apartment and insisted on staying, even after her repeated assurances that she would be fine. He was right when he said she didn't know what she'd need help with yet, and despite her desire to tough it out, there were some things that the pain made impossible. She was annoyed at herself, but by the time she'd sunk into the sofa her exhaustion was overwhelming and she found herself closing her eyes.<p>

Her father rustled around in her kitchen for a while before disturbing the cushion beside her. "Kate." He nudged her awake.

She blinked. "What is it?"

"Go to bed." He offered her a hand to help her stand.

"You don't need to stay while I _sleep_," she argued, knowing he would stand his ground.

He did. "It's fine. You've got a week's worth of crosswords at your front door and there's a game on in a little while."

There were disadvantages to disagreeing with your family members; stubbornness was apparently genetic. She'd always thought she'd gotten her tenacity from her mother (and when it verged on bullheadedness, her father had always been happy to agree with that assessment) but apparently it came from the Beckett line as well.

Beckett rolled her eyes, privately, and started towards the bedroom. "Fine. Don't look in the fridge; it'll only make you worry." If she recalled correctly, she had several biology experiments ongoing even_ before _the two weeks in hospital.

She lay in bed for several hours but slept fitfully. It was too quiet. Somehow, she'd managed to adapt to the muted noise of the hospital and without its comforting lull her mind found time to hypothesise. Wild theories were more Castle's domain, but in the blur between wake and sleep she found herself confused by the distinction between fact and fiction. When she woke properly, from a nonsensical dream, she felt her heart racing. It calmed as she took in air and her ceiling. _Hers_. She was in her apartment. Nothing was amiss.

The sun was low in the sky, casting her carpet and the lower half of the mattress in warm, golden light. Wiggling her toes, she curled into the duvet cover pleasantly. Despite her unrestful sleep, it was still good to be home.

Her father was sitting in front of the television unblinking when she slowly eased her way across the living room. Her healing muscles were sore from sleep and she didn't want to jar them. She rolled her neck from side to side, chancing pain in her sternum to brace it with one hand. "What are you watching?" she called to announce her presence.

Her father turned to face her. "Re-run of the last game in the 2009 world series. Carlos Ruiz just made his triple at the top of the third."

"I'll join you in a minute," she said. It was definitely time for another dose of the magic pills that made the pain subside. She made it to the kitchen and braced herself on the counter for a second, catching her breath.

"What are you doing in there?" Her father appeared in the doorway.

"Meds." She held up the bag and tried to look cheerful, but he wasn't buying it.

"You could've asked."

"I can get them myself."

Kate Beckett mentally reminded herself that she was lucky to be alive and so many people in her life that cared and a father that was there and who loved her and it was a small price to pay really, a few weeks of being babied to breaking point. She clenched her fist around the glass of water he handed her and tried to silence the less grateful parts of her personality. The taste of the pills washed down with the taste of sleep as she gulped down the water.

"Thanks."

It was a forced a smile, but the sentiment at least was genuine.

He answered with a knowing smile of his own. "I'm driving you crazy."

"You're not the only one." Her smile was a shrug.

"It's only for a little while," he reassured her. "They said six to eight weeks, and it's already been two."

Beckett changed the subject. "I was going to make tea, but I suppose you'll do it."

"Watch that tongue young lady."

"And in my own home." She sighed melodramatically and began her slow shuffle back to the couch. "Cups are above the microwave," she called over her shoulder.

Just as she was about lower herself into an armchair, someone knocked at her door. Her father poked his head into the room but she waved him off. "I can get it."

When she opened it, Castle was standing in her doorway, brandishing flowers, not unlike he had months before, and, just like before, she was surprised and a little bit pleased.

"Can I come in?" He didn't hand her the bouquet, but shuffled awkwardly until he was bracing the door open instead of her holding it there. Her hand fell to her side and then rose again to her chest, resting over her healing sternum.

"The doctors would've said no heavy lifting," he told her, another well-intentioned reminder, and she nodded.

"They did." She stepped back to let him past. "But how do you know that?"

"I've been consulting Doctor Google," he said.

She smiled. "Thank you, for the flowers."

"These ones even come in their own vase, because I thought you might be running short." He set them down next to the only arrangement she'd rescued from the hospital room. It was from Lanie, and she'd liked it because it had some kind of bloom with a delicate fragrance to it. "Besides, I didn't bring you one in the hospital."

"Liar." She grinned at him, leaning against the wall beside the bureau as he set down his flowers beside the others. "I could barely see through the windows for the height of the arrangements and balloons and get well cards. None of them had your name on them, but it reeked of you."

"Well maybe I did open a tab at the hospital gift shop so that your colleagues could send you whatever they wanted to," he admitted, sheepish. "But I didn't want them to have to worry about money."

"Just like you and Josh _colluded_to get me a private room and extended stay?"

He gulped. "Yes well... the doctors thought it would be good for you to stay and I ... please don't hurt me."

"You're lucky they have me on restricted physical activity." She narrowed her eyes at him.

"Don't doubt it."

"Uh. If it makes you feel better these can be 'I'm sorry I was jackass' flowers instead of 'get well soon' flowers." He suddenly didn't know what to do with his hands. They hung lamely about his pockets. "Because I am sorry, about being a jackass, for everything I've done since I've met you really, but especially the other night."

She grinned and let her teeth sink into her lip. "Everything you've done since you met me huh?"

"Well." His apprehension turned into curious scrutiny for a brief moment, and then he smiled, slyly, catching her meaning. "Are you flirting with me?"

Beckett raised her eyebrows at him and said with false innocence, "I would never."

He opened his mouth to follow up on that remark but her fingers pressed against his lips, relieving him of the chance.

"Don't." It wasn't reproach though; she was smiling. In fact he had the sense that even before he'd apologised, she'd long forgiven him. "My father's here and whatever you have to say, I can't imagine you want him to hear it."

As if on cue Jim Beckett appeared behind them to see who her visitor was. She pulled her hand away and shoved into the back pocket of her jeans awkwardly.

"Hey dad, just Castle." She managed to say it with only the hint of a squeak. Castle was probably the only one who noticed and she hoped he'd have the good sense not to comment.

They exchanged a familiar greeting and handshake, which she observed with her detective's eye and she was suddenly suspicious that they'd been talking a great deal in her absence. It made sense of course: there had been a lot of lurking in hospital corridors done by both of them. Their common ground was her, and Beckett made a note to press Castle for details or, more specifically, which embarrassing stories from her childhood had been told so she could make it explicit just what would happen if any of it showed up in a novel. Still, she wondered if she was where it ended as well as where it started.

Beckett had never really thought much about how they'd get along, Castle was a house on fire with almost everyone anyway, and her dad was ... her dad. It had never been easy to predict where he would bestow approval, but he'd taken to Castle when they'd first met, during the investigation of Raglan's murder. Now, though, she found herself curious about the extent of their interaction.

Jim Beckett moved towards the door. "You're out of milk or at least, milk that isn't nearly a month old. I thought I'd go pick up a few things."

She nodded, grateful for the privacy. After she'd locked the door behind her father she turned to Castle and they both stared at each other, deciding on what to do about the silence.

Finally, she swallowed and gestured toward the kitchen. "Tea?"

"Sure."

He followed her into the other room. She let her weight rest against her shoulder as they moved into the room. "By the way, I'm sorry too." She was alluding to their earlier conversation. "You weren't really _wrong_… I just disagreed with you."

"We don't always have to agree," he told her.

The kettle clicked off. She laughed once. "That would be kind of freaky actually," Beckett said as she poured the water into another mug.

Her hold on the kettle was two-handed, and he noticed the way she focussed on it and moved it with slow, deliberate precision. It didn't seem wise to offer assistance though: he already knew to pick his battles there. If only, he thought, he could learn where to pick them everywhere else.

"Maybe we should find less spectacular ways to disagree though." She set it back down and left the mugs to steep. "Come on. We'll wait for dad to get back."

He followed her to the sofa and watched curiously as she painstakingly lowered herself into the armrest. He sat beside her carefully. "Are you okay?"

"I'm tired," she admitted. "I thought, in the hospital, that I just couldn't wait to get home and get back to everything, but it's more exhausting than I thought it would be. The pain isn't too bad, if I'm careful. But sudden movements?" She shook her head. "Definitely not an option, at least for a while."

He left his arm resting along back of the chair, fingers within in whispering distance of her hair. She smiled to herself at that newfound habit.

"So, six weeks at home." He gave her a sly smile and observed, documentary-style, "However will the Beckett cope with her confined quarters?"

"With Richard Castle's latest novel, of course." She smiled at him. "I like it so far."

"So far? I'd have thought you'd be finished it by now."

She looked away. "I'm... savouring it. Besides, you did say I could make corrections."

He groaned. "Don't mention editing. Gina is still demanding rewrites and I'm still putting them off." He looked sheepish. "But I'd say there were extenuating circumstances. Speaking of which, if you're convinced they're not going to come back to take another pass at us, what was with the boys in blue outside my apartment? They haven't been there in a week but I can categorically tell you that's a waste of money that won't endear me to Gates. If you think we need it, I can pay people to do it privately."

She shook her head. "You'd have to vet them so thoroughly and even then I don't think we could ever be sure, and it was mostly a precautionary measure. Besides, it was only vaguely my idea."

"I'm going to choose to believe that means you think I could take care of myself," he remarked, "Not that you don't think I'm worth saving."

"I think I'll keep you around," she assured him.

"And I didn't even have to bribe you with Chinese food," he joked. "You're going soft Detective."

"I'm still open to bribes."

(The mere thought of food that didn't come from a hospital kitchen made her mouth water.)

"Well it's not food, but I did bring you something else," he remembered, reaching into his pocket.

"Castle, you can't just _buy _me things," she admonished, but she'd heard the hint of something serious in his tone, so it was muted.

"This is just-" he pulled out the chain with her mother's ring dangling from the end "-something I've been holding onto. They had to remove it in the ambulance in case they needed to defibrillate you, so I kept it."

She was suddenly frozen by the realisation that she was completely _happy_. It was enough to make her forget the shooting and the warehouse and Royce's death and the crushing disappointment each time a new lead led to nothing in her mother's case. Joy was simple. She usually liked to think she was too complicated for it, and maybe that was true, but not today. When she didn't move to take it from him, he reached out and pressed it into her palm, fingers lingering over hers.

"I thought it was lost," she murmured, turning it over in her hand.

She was dimly aware she was crying but she was smiling harder. With her head bowed, she wiped at the tears, then looked up. "Thank you Castle."

"I knew you wouldn't want to lose it," he said quietly, reaching out to tuck her hair behind her ears even though it was secure. His fingers brushed against her cheek, tracing her path hers had moments before.

It was a moment that crystallised at least something. She had been wavering on the subject of their fledging attempts at blurring the lines between partners and lovers. There was a strong argument to be made that they had both, in their own ways, stepped over the line anyway and there was no use pretending that they could go back. On the other hand, so much was changing. She didn't know if it was the right time to test their foundation by pursuing something new.

Or at least, she hadn't. But when he reached out to help her slip the chain over her head when she couldn't quite stretch her arms far enough without pain, she realised. He did know her, in a way that still surprised her. He made her happy and she loved him and maybe all the rest could be noise.

Beckett clenched her fist around the ring where it sat against her healing incision. She was staring at him.

"What?" He made a show of looking behind him. "What is it?"

"About what you said," she murmured.

He didn't ask what she meant. He assumed it didn't matter, nodded for her to continue.

"Do you trust me?" she asked.

"Of course I do."

"I won't leave you," she promised quietly, teeth sinking into her lip as she struggled internally with how to continue.

"You do remember." Castle suddenly found the upholstery on the arm of her sofa incredibly interesting, couldn't look at her. It was a bend in the road and he couldn't be sure what would be around the other side. If it led to nowhere, he wasn't sure he could watch her say it.

"I'm sorry."

"Is this the part where I let you explain it away, tell me it was just because of the situation, the adrenaline?"

"I didn't do any of that." She let her hand rest against his arm. "I wasn't going to. Unless you'd like me to, in which case I'm sure there's a case to be made for temporary-" the grin she sported was wicked, to match her tone "- or at least mostly temporary, insanity."

"I know." He found his sense of humour, waggled his eyebrows at her. "Lucky you were unconscious. You would have killed me for ripping off your shirt in front of all those people."

"Oh Castle." She was, absurdly she thought, still faintly embarrassed. "I suppose there were mitigating factors."

"It was a nice view, even with all the blood."

"You didn't even notice," she accused.

"Sadly, it was wasted on me," he confirmed. "The whole ordeal is kind of hazy to be honest. After you passed out, Lanie almost tackled me to start CPR and it was all so fast."

"Luckily for me." She let her fingers creep towards his hand. "I know you meant it when you said it Castle, so I won't rationalise it or excuse it, but it's not life and death anymore. Meaning it every day is a lot harder."

"I know."

"And maybe we're not ready for that."

"Kate."

"But maybe we are."

He gave her the most hopeful look she ever remembered seeing. She found herself hiding her grin with her hand in the face of it.

"But that's why you have to trust me." She squeezed his hand. "Don't push. I can't do this if you push me."

"Is that your roundabout way of saying …"

"We can try to do ... this, whatever it is," she finished his sentence. "You and me. If I can lead."

"Was that ever in question?" He was trying to hide his smile, completely ineffectually. His mouth was slipping at the sides and besides, she could see it in his eyes. Then again, she knew where to look.

His arm slipped down her shoulders and encouraged her into his side. She didn't move though, except to nudge her elbow against him gently. "Castle."

"What?"

She looked pointed at his hand until he pulled away, looking a little bit wounded. She gave him a sad smile.

"I'm not ready to start something right this minute." She was hugging herself, and looked over at him, imploring.

"It doesn't really feel like we're _starting_."

The moment, it seemed, had shifted. She felt everything catch up with her after the brief respite. "We're not." She uncrossed her arms when he pulled at her elbow, shifting so her body faced him and bracing one folded arm on the back of the sofa. "But … there are things I have to do first. Not Josh, if that's what you're thinking. We – well. There were lots of reasons. But with everything that's happened, I'm still processing."

"Beckett, I understand. You need to put everything back in its place." He tapped at her temple. "Up here."

She nodded slowly. "And you need to rush at it headlong because you're afraid we'll miss our chance."

He looked incredibly guilty. "Well. At least we both know where we stand."

"Makes a change doesn't it?" She stretched her foot in a circle in the red-gold sunbeam cutting across the rug.

He stared at it for a moment. "Come on." He stood and offered his hands to help her rise. "I want to show you something."

She followed him over to the window. The shutters were drawn across her mother's murder board and he unfolded them to reveal the stained glass window but didn't spare a glance at the facts. Instead, he opened the window with a concerted tug and hung out of it. Reflexively, her hand grabbed at his shirt in concern. He laughed at her as he pulled his head back in. "Go on, look."

Bending forward in spite of her body's protests, she looked east along the street grid.

"What is it?" She turned the other way and shielded her eyes from the setting sun. "Oh."

He moved to get a better view from behind her, a hand at her elbow. "Manhattanhenge," he told her, raising his voice to be heard over the traffic.

She turned to face him, her hair catching the light. It was an image he didn't think he would ever forget.

"How long have you lived in New York Castle?"

The look she gave him was entirely incredulous, pure Kate Beckett. It made it much harder for him to hide his smile.

"Most of my life. Don't tell me you're too jaded to appreciate this Kate."

She turned back to the sunset, the light bathing the buildings in its brilliant glow. Above them the sky was streaked yellow and orange. She was smiling though he couldn't see it and leaned back into him, her shoulder finding the plane of his chest. His fingers slipped against her elbow. She pulled her head back inside the apartment after a few minutes, her body too stiff to maintain the position for too long, and he found her staring at him with a kind of wonder.

"Some things are always beautiful," he said after bumping his head slightly on the window as he drew it in.

When he was standing in front of her, close enough that he could feel her even as distance remained between them, she reached out and brushed her fingers along his jaw. Her eyes followed them, remained fixed, even though she could feel him staring at her as she considered logistics. Moving was too difficult, so she pulled his mouth to hers with her hand, thumb pressing into his chin and fingers curling into his neck. It was the barest of kisses really, experimental. Before he could close his eyes to it, he felt her watching him as her hands mapped his face, and met her eyes.

They stared at each other, lips still touching.

In her chest, her heart protested. She felt it stutter and raised her palm to her chest to feel it.

He pulled away. "Are you –"

"Fine," she cut him off. "Just … I feel it more, than I used to."

"Careful." He reached out to feel it himself and she trapped his palm against her chest with her own moving it slowly up to her neck, where her carotid pulse throbbed beneath his fingers. He finished his sentence, "You might be sending mixed messages."

"It's not," she told him with simple faith in her own opinion.

"Really?" He brought a thumb up to the underside of her chin, tracing its curve slowly. "What is it then?"

"A promise." She met his eyes. "That I'm alive and I won't leave you."

It was her way of saying something else. He held onto her hand and felt his chest full of it.


End file.
